


Game Start!

by AsagiStilinski



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Derek Hale, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Amusement Park, Alternate Universe- Werewolves are still a thing, Amusement Parks, Attempted Kidnapping, Bad Puns, Canon-Typical Violence, Card Games, Competition, Crossover, Deadly Games, Duel Monsters, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Hurt Stiles, Hurt Stiles Stilinski, Kidnapping, M/M, Mild torture, Rich Derek Hale, The Hale Pack - Freeform, Tournaments, Werewolf Stiles Stilinski, alternate universe- yugioh, eventually, sbamusement, sterekbingo, sterekbingo2018, warning: probably terribly inaccurate playing of Duel Monsters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-12
Updated: 2018-05-12
Packaged: 2019-05-06 01:31:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 33,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14631267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AsagiStilinski/pseuds/AsagiStilinski
Summary: Derek Hale, the incredibly rich game developer that Stiles and his freinds keep running into somehow, has opened his first dueling tournament to the public- the prize? More than enough money for Stiles to pay off his hospital bills, the problem is, winning the tournament isn't even going to be his biggest challenge, in fact, hisbiggestchallenge may just be surviving the first night of the game...There's more to this tournament than meets the eye, and Stiles' vision is about to becomeveryclear, as the world of magic, deception, and lethal games suddenly opens it's self up to accept a new player...Or: The Yu-Gi-Oh: Duel Monsters crossover nobody asked for





	Game Start!

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer: I have never actually played Duel Monsters and, despite being a huge YGO fan since the age of like... seven... I still don't understand most of the inner workings of the game, therefore, this is probably going to have alot of inaccuracies and I am _so sorry_ \- I tried**
> 
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> 
> With that being said, THIS beast is .. I don't even know how it got away from me like this, it was supposed to be a shorter like... 10Kish thing focusing more on Derek and Stiles antagonizing eachother during the tournament and instead it turned into this, although I admit, I like this idea MUCH better
> 
> I don't say this often, but if people are really interested, I might actually do a sequel, there's a very rich history/universe here that I'd love to explore if I ever got up the motivation (although writing out the full duel almost KILLED me so I may never do that again)

"Alright, what the HELL is wrong with you Hale!?"

In response to his name, the slightly older man glanced up from his desk, eyebrows raised questioningly, before glancing down at the papperwork in front of him again

"You're going to have to be more specific,"

_More specific_?

Was he ASKING Stiles to punch him in the face?

"Your stupid tournament and your RIDICULOUS rules! What made you think this was ok!?"

"Again, you're going to have to be more specific,"

Furious, the nineteen-year-old stomped towards the desk across from him and slapped down a pamphlet, opened up to the first page, and glared at the man in front of him

" _Participants must wager their rarest card in order to enter the tournament_? What the HELL Hale!?"

Very breifly, he glanced up from the page, eyes directing at the pamphlet, before going back down the work in front of him

"Oh, that,"

"What do you mean _oh that_!? What is WRONG with you, making people offer up their rarest cards!? You own the biggest gaming company in the world, you're FILTHY rich, why are you trying to take OUR cards!?"

"If it bothers you so much then don't enter, in fact, I'd prefer you didn't,"

Oh like _hell_!

If anything, Stiles was just going to be more determined to enter now

"I'm serious Derek! Why are you asking people to offer up rare cards in order to play? And what's possessing you to host this stupid tournament to begin with anyway? It doesn't really seem like your style,"

Derek was kind of... quiet

He seemed to prefer being out of the public eye and keeping to himself

Honestly, if it wasn't for Duel Monsters, Stiles was pretty sure that he wouldn't even have a clue about who Derek Hale was, even though he was one of the richest people in America

Even with Duel Monsters though, he always seemed kind of quiet, in some way, and this... this just made no sense

"I'm hosting it in my new amusement park, it's good advertising,"

"Oh please, that's not why and we both know it, and even if it was, that still doesn't explain this rare card thing,"

"Don't you have somewhere to _be_ Stiles?"

The younger man bit the inside of his lip, holding back the urge to reach out and throttle the dark-haired man across from him

The urge was a mighty one though...

"Tell me why you're asking for rare cards and I'll leave,"

"I have a better idea- you leave, and I won't call security,"

Finally, Derek was looking up, giving Stiles his full attention as he stared innocently up at the boy, as if he _hadn't_ just threatened Stiles' well-being....

"I'm serious,"

"So am I,"

It really didn't sound like he was willing to be swayed, but that wasn't going to stop Stiles from trying

"You're not even going to tell me?"

Derek heaved a long, loud sigh, staring up at Stiles somewhat unimpressed

"It makes you a better duelist, if you're playing such high stakes then you don't have to be ambitious to win, you just have to be terrified enough not to lose, you get it? There are two motivating factors now, both winning AND not losing,"

"That makes zero sense,"

Derek only shrugged and went back to what he was doing, as if he couldn't care less about Stiles' existence

It was _infuriating_

"Don't you think this is a little too cruel even for you?"

"No,"

Well that answered alot of questions....

"You're really going to make people give up their rarest cards just to participate?"

"First of all, if they win all of their battles, they don't lose anything, and second of all, I'm not forcing anyone to enter, if they're that afraid of losing their cards then they don't have to participate,"

"But you KNOW that all serious duelists will!"

"Then you have to ask yourself, what's more important? Greed or glory?"

Stiles sneered, anger simmering in his blood as he glared at the older man

"What turned you into such a prick?"

"I imagine the same thing that turned you into one,"

Stiles bit the inside of his lip, but didn't say anything more, turning on his heel and heading for the door

"Stiles," Derek called lowly, finally glancing up from his work and drawing Stiles' attention towards him

"If you want to keep your dragon, you shouldn't enter the tournament, just.... take my word for that,"

Stiles decided to take that opportunity to do what he felt he should have a long time ago: Flip Derek off and tell him where to stick his Blue Eyes before stomping out of the office

 

~+~

 

"Freaking Derek Hale.... freaking tournament.... freaking rules....."

Two days later, Stiles was still boiling

It wasn't like he could just choose not to enter or something, he had no choice

The prize money for winning the tournament was a million dollars, he could use that- he _needed_ that, if he was ever going to pay off his father's hospital bills and the mortgage on the house, he needed that prize money...

"Just relax Stiles, you're a fantastic duelist, you won't lose your Red Eyes and you'll get that prize money, if it comes down to you and Scott in the finals, Scott will get the title and you'll get the cash, and I'm sure he won't take your Red Eyes,"

"Kira, why do you just _assume_ Scott is going to beat me? He may have won the last tournament-"

Ok, last _three_ tournaments

"-but that doesn't necessarily mean he'll beat me, I've learned alot since the last time I played against him you know,"

"Oh I'm sure! I'm just saying, it'll probably come down to the two of you so you don't have to worry about the final battle," she said quickly

It was fine, he knew that she was completely supportive of Scott- to a fault, really... and it wasn't like she was wrong

Scott McCall had won the last three gaming tournaments in the last year and a half, he wasn't called The King Of Games for no reason

Stiles didn't want to take his charity, if it were up to his pride he never would have agreed to let Scott give him the prize money if he won, but...

It wasn't just Stiles' pride on the line, it was his dad's health, his home, he couldn't forefit the option of having that money for _anything_ , not Derek, not pride...

And not his favorite card

"Just try to relax Stiles, you have nothing to worry about,"

"Thanks Allison," he mumbled quietly

He still felt raw and irritated about the situation... but the reminder that Scott was there to catch him if he _absolutely_ needed him provided atleast a few ounces of comfort, even though the thought of losing and having to rely on Scott to save his butt _again_ made him physically ill

Though... the thought of losing his Red Eyes Black Dragon was far worse...

"So, speaking of rare cards we're wagering, I have to ante up my Red Eyes and Scott is putting up the card he won at Duelist's Kingdom, but what about you two?"

He felt it was a good time to talk about this, they needed to know eachother's vulnerabilities if they were going to help eachother stay alive- metaphorically speaking

Stiles traveled in a group of six on average, with occasional visits from a few other duelists, and _all_ of them wanted to win for their own reasons

Be it pride, money, cards....

But none of them wanted to lose their rarest cards and they all were in agreement that they were going to help eachother keep those cards- and help eachother get into the finals

The preliminary tournament would take place in Derek Hale's amusement park- Monster Land- until there were ten finalists, at wich point they would enter the finals and pair down to the quarter, semi, and podium finals, until a winner was finally announced

With ten finalist spots, that left plenty of room for all of them to make it to the second half of the tournament and take a shot at the crown

In addition to that, they were planning to keep their rare cards within their personal social circle, if someone lost their card then it would be up to someone else to win it back for them

Stiles was counting on his freinds to keep his Red Eyes Black Dragon safe and he wanted to know what cards to keep his eyes open for when he was dueling, should the worst happen

"I have a Dark Magician Girl, that's my rarest," Kira noted

"I have a Crush card,"

Scott, who had been shuffling his deck as a form to calm himself, immediately dropped his cards

Kira dropped her phone

And Stiles dropped his jaw

"What the- .... Malia! How in the hell did you get a Crush card!?"

Crush Virus Cards were extremely rare, costing upwards of a thousand dollars and having been discontinued years ago for being too powerfull

There were only a few left in the world and mostly they were either kept by extremely serious collectors or used by extremely serious duelists

Duelists like Derek Hale, who, for the record only had one Crush card wich he had stopped using in play years ago

How did Malia- who's deck was mostly second-hand- end up with one!?

"I won it in a tournament a few months ago, but it was a day before Scott won that Dungeon Dice tournament so I never got around to mentioning it," she shrugged, as if forgetting to mention something trivial like an untied shoe or the weather, instead of the fact that she was in possession of one of the rarest cards in the world

"You have to be kidding me..." Stiles breathed

Malia shook her head, fanning out her deck and pulling out the card to show him as evidence

"I wouldn't even be putting it up, but you have to register every card in your deck and the only way to keep it would be if I didn't use it in the tournament, wich seems pretty useless,"

Stiles had to agree, if she had a card that powerfull it would be useless not to use it in a tournament with such high stakes

"What about you Allison? What card are you putting up?"

The other brunette glanced up from her deck, about to speak when the door behind them suddenly opened, jolting everyone out of the conversation

"Lydia! How'd it go?"

The strawberry blonde woman behind him smirked, holding out a simple plastic card- an entry card

"How do you think? Did you _really_ believe that I wouldn't even qualify for the tournament?"

"Not for a second," Stiles grinned back, rising from his seat and brushing his hands off on his jeans

"Guess it's my turn, wish me luck," he said with a wave, heading to the door of the backroom that Lydia had just come from

He was glad that they had gotten in on signing up for this tournament early, so far there weren't that many participants yet and their group was the only one at the Qualification Center tonight, giving them plenty of time to go through the process without getting rushed or crowded

Ofcourse, he still wasn't sure what the qualification process _was_ yet, but Lydia and Allison had already been through it and it had taken them each close to an hour, but despite thorough questioning from everyone in the group, Allison wouldn't say a word on what the process actually was, so he was going in pretty blindly

The second the door was closed, he took a look around the room, and found it to be ... honestly a little drab

It was just a plain room with no computers or desks, no table or chairs- well, except the one being used by the other person in the room, a person that Stiles happily recognized

"Erica, I didn't think you'd be doing clerk duty,"

"Oh I'm not, sign-ups for this tournament aren't as simple as just signing some pappers or paying an entrance fee, in order to participate, you have to defeat me in a duel,"

"That all?" Stiles teased playfully

Erica was a good duelist, but she wasn't one of the best, and for someone of Stiles' callibar, it wouldn't be that hard to defeat her, but she would easily weed out the amateurs from those who actually _belonged_ in the competition so Stiles understood why she was there

Ofcourse, Stiles really doubted that she would be trying _too_ hard to defeat him anyway, after all, a tournament needed participants, and if the goal was to defeat all potential sign-ups, there wouldn't be any competition to hold

This was just a test, nothing more

"Not quite," Erica grinned back, slowly rising from her chair

"I have to explain how this works first, _then_ we can begin, but first, you have to give me your word that you won't tell anyone about what happens in here, we're working with yet-to-be-released technology that only tournament participants will be lucky enough to use, we can't risk non-participants getting their ears in on our information, you know, for legal reasons,"

"Right right, my lips are sealed," he promised, mimicking locking his lips and throwing away the key

"Perfect, now... do you remember back at Duelist Kingdom, the experimental hologram disk that Derek used against you?"

How could he forget?

That had been freaking _humiliating_

The Duelist Kingdom Tournament had been just over a year ago, the best duelists from around the world had gathered on an island to participate

The official dueling arenas were just that- arenas

Enormous play boxes with a holographic game feild where cards could be scanned, uploaded, and played all in a matter of seconds

But Derek had brought a little something extra along with him to the tournament to test out- _portable_ holographic disks

They were a little confusing to use, and because of that, when Stiles had challenged him to an unofficial duel, Derek had won easily

(Well... his inexperience with the disk wasn't the _only_ reason, he admitted, Derek's skills were nothing to sneeze at and Stiles' in comparison hadn't been all that great at the time, but the disks didn't help anything)

"Good, then this will be easier for you,"

"Don't tell me we're using those things again..."

"Not exactly," Erica grinned, taking a few steps away and pulling out a sleek, silver and blue wing-shaped disk from behind the chair, and then another along with it

"This is the new and _very_ much improved Duel Disk, much easier to use, just strap it to your arm, activate it, then use the cards as follows: The open spaces on top are for summoning monsters and magic cards, and the slots on the front and side are for playing traps and placing magics face down, pretty easy right?"

"Yeah.... and they don't spin do they?"

"They don't spin, but the technology is alot more advanced, the holographs are alot more realistic than what you saw in Duelist Kingdom,"

In Duelist Kingdom the holographs had been realistic enough for an attack blast to literally blow his shirt back, the thought of making it more realistic than THAT....

"Gee, how grand," Stiles snorted dryly

Erica just seemed amused, strapping her duel disk to her arm and demonstrating how to activate it, then waiting for Stiles to do the same

"Before we start, I'll go ahead and explain how qualifying works once you get through the competition, if you defeat me, you'll win entry into the Hale Corp Duel Monsters Tournament, wich will include a free Tournament registered Duel Disk, Tournament registered gauntlet, and one star chip, in order to qualify for the finals, you'll need to earn twelve more star chips for a total of thirteen, per battle you must ante up your rarest card and no more or less than one star chip, failure to comply with these rules will result in disqualification, once you've earned thirteen star chips you'll have a message sent to your duel disk alerting you to the next location, once there, you'll find a trade-in machine, insert your star chips and you'll have an official qualification card given to you in return wich will act as both an entry card AND a map to the location of the second half of the game, if you should lose all of your star chips at any time you'll be out of the tournament, are these rules clear?"

"For the most part yeah, but how do you know for sure where someone's star chips come from?"

In Duelist Kingdom they had used something similar- tokens, but you could wager as many tokens per duel as you wanted, wich meant that a bad bet could cost you your entire stock

Scott had made that bad bet as a matter of fact and did, in fact, lose all of his tokens to some skeevy psychopath

If it hadn't been for everyone else deciding to give him some of their tokens instead so he could qualify for the finals, he never would have gotten in...

"You just let Hale Corp handle that, and _believe me_ , we'll know if a rule is broken, now.... you ready to do this?"

Stiles grinned, drawing six cards from his deck and fanning them out in his hand

" _Born_ ready,"

 

~+~

 

Two weeks passed from registration to the tournament beginning, and Stiles was practically biting down on each second

He was eager and anxious all at once and that morning of the Tournament's beginning he found himself standing with his five teammates outside the gate of Monster Land, waiting for them to open in a nearly jittery fashion

_"Welcome Duelists, to Hale Corp's first annual Duel Monsters Tournament!"_

First annual?

Derek was planning to throw one of these things every year...?

Something _had_ to be in it for him....

He couldn't focus on that now though, for right now he just had to concentrate on winning this thing, and the repetition of the rules going on over the loud speakers above him

His heart was pounding and his throat felt tight, he was starting to physically _itch_ with the need to get inside and start this thing, wich is why he felt so incredibly relieved when the gates finally began to open

_"Without further ado, we'd like to welcome you to Hale Corp's Duel Monsters Tournament, let the games begin!"_

The people ahead of them practically raced into the park, and Stiles wasn't far behind them

As much as he wanted to start dueling right away, he had to admit that he was pretty enamored with the park it's self

Everything was Duel Monsters themed, from the Slyfer The Sky Dragon rollercoaster to the Legendary Fisherman magnetic fishing game, to the Mystic Tomato Cafe'...

It was more than a little impressive

"Where should we start? Should we go in a specific direction or just kind of wander around until we run into somebody we want to duel?"

"Actually Stiles... I was thinking maybe we should split up," Scott said hesitantly

"What? But... we can't split up! There's safety in numbers! How do you think we got to the finals at Duelist Kingdom!?"

"Yeah but Duelist Kingdom was a different format and alot less of us were actually participating, if we have any hope of _all_ of us making it to the finals, we need to split up and go after our own opponents, atleast for a wile, otherwise ten other people may get the star chips they need to make it to the finals before we do,"

As much as Stiles hated to admit it- really, _really_ hated to admit it.... Scott had a point

If the six of them traveled together they'd spend all day and only get one or maybe two star chips each, whereas they could easily get atleast twice as many if they went their separate ways by the time the park closed for the day....

"You know that I absolutely HATE to admit that you're right but.... you're right," he said with a frustrated breath

"Good, then we'll split for a few hours and meet back up at the carousel at.... what do you say? Seven?"

"I guess so, when does this place close anyway?"

"No idea, I guess we'll find out sooner or later though," Scott said with a slight shrug

"I guess..."

That still sounded somewhat odd though...

"So, meet back at seven, until then, good luck everyone," Scott smiled confidently

"Yeah," Stiles agreed hesitantly, watching everyone starting to disperse

"Good luck...."

 

~+~

 

"You're finished Stilinski, and I'm going to expose you for the third-rate duelist you are! Now my Great White, attack his Mystical Elf and finish this!"

He hoped that she would do that

"Not so fast Tracy," he grinned, flipping his face-down card to the face-up position

"I'm using my Sheild And Sword card! Now our monsters' attack points are swapped with their defense points, meaning that my Elf now has an attack power of 2,000, whereas your shark has dropped all the way down to 800, thus making my Elf more than strong enough to obliterate him!"

Tracy shreiked in frustration as the Elf began to chant her spell, the holographic shark squealing as it was shattered into peices on the feild

"No!!!"

"Who's the apex predator now?" Stiles beamed, his heart soaring with excitement as he listened to the life points on Tracy's duel disk tick down to zero

"So if I'm third-rate, does that make you fourth-rate?" he asked with a smirk, taking a step closer and holding his hand out to her

"Good game though, really, but I've gotta collect my winnings now,"

His opponent looked _far_ less than pleased, but knew she didn't have any choice, grumbling as she peeled her only star chip out of her gauntlet and a card out of her deck, handing them both over with clear frustration

"Thanks,"

He felt bad for taking her card, but rules were rules and he knew she had every intention of taking his Red Eyes if she had won

He ignored the brush off she gave him as he secured the star chip in his gauntlet, then took a glance at the card she had given him

_Destiny Dice_?

"I've never even heard of this card..."

It must be pretty rare then.... luck was his

He shuffled the card into his deck, then got started on looking for his next target

 

~+~

 

By the time he had two more wins under his belt, he was feeling pretty confident

It was only mid-afternoon and he was roughly a quarter of the way to his goal

If he kept on track like this then he could easily end up with half the stars he needed by the time the day was over

Sliding his new rare card into his deck, he started walking towards the center of the park, deciding to get away from the fringes he had mostly been operating around and try to get to the center of the action instead

He would probably find alot more opponents that way

As he started walking, he took notice of the dragon themed carousel and felt a slight smirk start to form on his lips

The carousel had the most well-known dragons in the game on it, all cutiefied- Blue Eyes White Dragon, Red Eyes Black Dragon, Curse Of Dragon, Thousand Year Dragon, Baby Dragon, and the list goes on

It was kind of adorable and even though it wasn't working yet- the rides and games weren't, although the food stands and break areas were open for tired duelists- he was .. oddly tempted to get closer to it

He wasn't sure why, but he felt.... a weird _urge_ to keep getting closer and closer

As he started approaching though, he also started to feel very... very... strange...

His vision was starting to blur, his heart rate starting to slow, his head was feeling incredibly foggy, his body was going numb, legs buckling, but before he could fall forward, something- or someone- caught him by the waist

_"Stiles?? Stiles... are you ok? Stiles?"_

The voice... sounded familiar but... but he couldn't place it.....

He could feel someone lift him off of his feet, head flopping back as he stared up at the face above him

It was blurry but he could clearly see a face, soft features, green eyes... _Derek_.....?

Try as he might, he couldn't stay awake anymore, and soon found himself completely passed out

 

~+~

 

_"Stiles? Stiles are you ok?? Stiles!?"_

He gasped loudly, jerking upwards and feeling his heart pounding in his chest, a sense of panic having flooded his veins

Where the hell.. what the hell... why the hell...!?

Swallowing tightly, he slowly looked over and felt a slight wave of releif when he saw who had been trying to wake him

"Kira...?"

"Stiles, what happened?"

"I.... I don't know..."

Upon sitting up, he took in a better idea of where he was

A little pavilion not far from the carousel with a strangely comfortable bench inside, clearly meant to be a resting area

Somebody had covered him with a Blue Eyes White Dragon souvenir blanket- and, pause here: Seriously what the hell was Derek Hale's love affair with that freaking dragon? It was everywhere! Stiles had a feeling he had some kinda sexual relationship with that card, wich was scary- and had safely removed his duel disk and tucked it under his arm so it wouldn't get damaged or stolen

After a breif moment of extra panic he checked his gauntlet to make sure all of his star chips were there and then his deck to make sure he still had all of his cards, then finally allowed himself a breath to relax

"You don't remember anything at all?"

"Not really... I'd just finished a duel and all of a sudden I.. got this weird urge to go to the carousel... then next thing I knew I started feeling groggy and crappy and I just... passed out,"

There _was_ that lingering memory of Derek catching him but that had to have been a dream, Derek Hale was only nice to animals and small children- and even that was probably something he preferred people not to know about him

"Are you ok? Have you been drinking water? Keeping your blood sugar level?"

"Um... no.... but I felt fine before I crashed, and I really don't think that's what it was..."

Kira frowned with concern, leaning over and gently placing her hand against Stiles' head, wich he appreciated, but politely turned away from- it was unnecessary, she didn't need to worry

"How many chips do you have now, by the way?" Stiles asked suddenly, apparently managing to jerk Kira out of her concern for a moment as an absolutely face-splitting grin as she showed off her gauntlet

"Wah.... six!? How do you already have six?! How long was I asleep for!?"

Kira was a good duelist, he had no reason to believe she wouldn't get _atleast_ half of her gauntlet full before they were scheduled to meet up, but to have gotten six in only a few hours...

"Um, well, it's just after six now..."

"WHAT!?"

He had been asleep for _three hours_!?

"Oh man I've gotta catch up!" he shouted anxiously, leaping up from the bench and stumbling a little

"Um, I really think you should eat something first..."

"No way! I can't afford to waste any more time if I'm going to get to the finals, I've gotta find another duel NOW!"

"Stiles, why don't I just give you one of my chips? Then we'll be even and you can eat-"

The look Stiles gave her must have said it all, as she immediately winced at her own proposition

"Yeah... ok.... that sounded bad...."

"It's fine, I know you're just trying to help, but... I've really got to do this Kira, on my own,"

"Ok.. but THEN you'll eat something?"

"Sure," he promised with a gentle smile

Kira smiled back, clearly relieved, and took his hand as they started walking away from the pavilion

He really adored Kira, not in a romantic way- she was Scott's girlfreind after all- but just... platonically, like a sister

She was so supportive and gentle and sweet, and no matter how competitive she got she never once let it get in the way of someone else's well-being, wich was a pretty rare thing in any competitive feild but especially so in Duel Monsters, there weren't alot of duelists that Stiles had come across who could say that

Plus, she was a _wickedly_ good player

No matter how nice she was off the feild, when it came down to the game, she was absolutely _ruthless_ , and watching her play was akin to watching some kind of cheetah or tiger or other gracefull predator take down prey

It was stunning and in some weird way both majestic and incredibly brutal and scarring

"Have you seen any of the others yet?"

"No, everyone has really scattered," Kira said with a slight frown as they walked, nose wrinkling slightly

"I went as far as the water park and didn't see anyone else,"

"Huh... that's kinda weird..."

But then again, in all fairness, Monster Land was pretty freaking huge, it was less like an average amusement park and more like some branch of Disneyland or something...

No wonder Derek had decided to have the tournament there

"Stiles Stilinski!"

Freezing in place, Stiles slowly turned around, eyebrows raising in surprise as caught sight of the person who had called out to him

"Isaac?"

"Stilinski, I challenge you to a duel,"

"Well as much as I love a good chance to kick your butt Lahey, I'm only dueling for star chips today, sorry,"

Isaac smirked, a glint in his copper eyes as he held up a dueling gauntlet and showed off five shiny chips of his own

"Are mine not good enough for you?"

What..?

But... Isaac worked for Hale Corp, why was he in the tournament...?

"Hale Corp employees are allowed in the tournament....?"

"As long as we were good enough to qualify we are, we had to pass the same qualifications you did- ante our rarest card, beat Erica in a duel, start with one chip, etc..."

"But why are Hale Corp employees allowed in the tournament if this is a promotional stunt for the theme park? I can't imagine it would look good for Derek if the winner of his first big tournament worked for him," Stiles frowned

"Don't know, don't care, PR really isn't my thing... but kicking your butt is,"

Stiles snorted, smirking as he activated his duel disk and drew his hand of cards

"Ooh Isaac... I am going to enjoy beating the scarf off of you,"

 

~+~

 

"You're in a pretty tight spot Stilinski, you ready to give up yet?" Isaac smirked, adjusting the scarf around his neck

Stiles didn't know why he was wearing a scarf in the _summer_ , but all duelists had those weird quirky things and this was just one of Isaac's

"In your dreams," Stiles snorted back

"Oh I don't think so Stilinski, look at the feild! My monster is stronger than both of your's, and thanks to my Mask Of Restrict, you aren't allowed to sacrifice your monsters and get any stronger ones, not that that'll be a problem much longer, all I need to do is take out _one_ of your monsters and your life points will hit zero,"

Unfortunately, he was right....

He was in a tight spot, and it would only take one more attack before he was finished

So he would just have to end this fight before it got that far...

"Stiles!! Look who I found at the snack bar!"

When he turned around, he was somewhat relieved and excited to see that Kira had brought back not only food from her snack run, but a freind as well

"Allison!"

"Hey All-Star," Allison grinned playfully, waving her six-starred gauntlet at Stiles teasingly

"You'd better win this if you want to catch up,"

"Oh trust me, I have no intention of losing," Stiles smirked back

He didn't seem to be the only one distracted by Allison though, Isaac had taken his eyes off of the feild for a moment, a saddened, somewhat bitter expression on his face

He wondered why....

"I've had enough of this," Isaac hissed, turning back to the duel and gritting his teeth

"Mystical Genie Of The Lamp, attack his Marie The Fallen One!"

Stiles smirked, eyes twinkling

"I was hoping you would do that," he grinned, flipping his face-down card over to the face-up position

"I activate my spell-card: Polymorization! Now Marie The Fallen One and The Forgiving Maiden can fuse together to form St. Joan, no sacrifice required! And with a thousand points over your Genie, she easily gets the win of this match,"

"No!" Isaac shouted in frustration, glaring at the feild as his monster was obliterated and his life points dropped down to zero

"How many times do I have to tell you Isaac? I'm not third-rate anymore," Stiles said seriously, de-activating his duel disk and walking across what used to be the feild, holding his hand out to collect his winnings

Isaac sighed, eyes closing breifly before taking a star chip out of his gauntlet and his deck out of his duel disk, fanning it open and plucking a card from it

"As much as it PAINS me to say it... you earned this," he said begrudgingly

Honestly? That was almost as good as the chip and card

_Almost_

"Thanks," Stiles smiled, placing the chip in his gauntlet and grabbing the card, a smile blooming across his face as he stared down at his new acquisition

"Summoned Skull... oh man I've been wanting one of these for years!"

"Well, it's your's now, don't lose it,"

"Thanks..."

"Don't thank me for something I didn't even have a choice in," Isaac snorted back, stepping away as Stiles started heading for Kira and Allison- and not to mention the promise of food

"See you later Stilinski, try not to get nocked out of the tournament before the finals, it'll look bad for me if you do,"

Stiles just snorted, eyes rolling as he watched Isaac disappear around the corner, before turning back towards the girls

"That was an amazing move Stiles!" Kira beamed

"Thanks, now I'm almost caught up to you two, if we can find another duelist fast maybe I can make it to a half dozen before we have to meet Scott and the others,"

"Actually... there's been a change of plans," Allison interrupted

"I came to find you guys because I talked to Lydia about an hour ago, she had talked to Scott and Malia, after the announcement they decided to postpone meeting up until nine,"

"What announcement?" Stiles frowned

"What do you mean 'what announcement'? The one that Cora Hale made, how could you have missed it?"

"Ooooh that must have happened wile you were asleep!" Kira blurted out

"You took a nap?" Allison frowned

"No no, he got dehydrated and passed out," Kira corrected

"What?! Stiles-!"

"It was NOT dehydration and would you please tell me what announcement you're talking about?" Stiles sighed loudly

"Cora Hale came over the park about two hours ago in a helicopter and announced that the park would be open for twenty-four hours for the length of the tournament, the park won't close until the finals start,"

"What?! Is Derek freaking NUTS!? People won't go home, they won't sleep, they'll just play until they lose! They'll be totally sleep-deprived and not making good decisions!"

"That's probably exactly WHY Derek is doing it," Allison frowned, taking a couple of dice out of her pocket and starting to twirl them between her fingers- something she did to relax, much like Scott shuffling his cards

"Derek only wants the best of the best in the finals, no one who might get there by luck or just because they were having a good day, everyone will be sleep-deprived wich will leave good players open to bad decisions... but it'll leave mediocre players open to even _worse_ decisions, this will weed out the lucky, in a way,"

"But still...." Stiles muttered

He didn't like how this game was going....

Derek was an honorable player- _always_

It was one of the reasons that Stiles really respected him, even if he was kind of a jerk at times, he was honorable and never pulled anything dirty or underhanded, no matter what the circumstances were, the games were always 100% clean and legal and _fair_ , so why was he rigging the stakes like this?

Why was he so desperate to get "only the best" in the finals?

Why was he allowing his employees to play when they had access to advantages the general public didn't have?

Why was he so obsessed with rare cards all of a sudden when he _had_ pretty much every card in the game?

Something didn't feel right... something felt downright horrible

"Something about this feels wrong, REALLY wrong..."

"I wouldn't be so sure, it seems like Derek's usual, over-dramatic style, the only thing that doesn't fit is the amusement park, but I have a feeling that's a corporate thing," Allison said with a shrug

She would know

Her family had a rival gaming company against the Hales

Where the Hales dealt in cards, the Argents dealt in dice

Allison was known as the Dice Queen, only ever having been defeated by Scott, and judging by her amount of star chips, she seemed to be pretty good at Duel Monsters too...

But regardless, her family had their own corporate shenanigans that they were always putting her up to, so he supposed she would know what seemed like a PR stunt and what didn't, but...

"It just doesn't feel like Derek...."

"Wich part exactly? Putting you down or sniping rare cards?"

"It isn't like that," Stiles frowned

Derek had.... _problems_ with Stiles and his freinds, but as much as he grated on Stiles' nerves sometimes, he also knew that somewhere in that big brooding shell was a sensitive heart, and he felt kind of ... bad... for Derek when people just assumed the worst of him simply because he had a prickly personality

It was like assuming someone was a cannibal just because they weren't vegetarian...

"It doesn't matter," Kira interjected quickly

"What we need to focus on is getting to the finals, BEATING this tournament, not the ins and outs of it, so can we please just go sit down and eat before Stiles starves to death and then get back to playing?"

She had a point, as much as Stiles wanted to figure this out, time was ticking and he was behind, if he wanted to get that prize money for his father, he needed to win eight more chips...

"You're right," he said softly, smiling and reaching out for the hot dog she had gotten for him

"Yeah... you're right Kira, we're sorry," Allison smiled sympathetically, putting her dice back in her pocket and grabbing the bottle of coke in Kira's hands

" _Thank you_ ," she said with a relieved breath

"Should we find a place to sit down now? I'd rather not eat and walk," Stiles hummed, groaning in releif at the taste of food finally hitting his mouth

"Sounds like a plan," Allison nodding, unscrewing the cap of the bottle, but as she took a step forward, some guy on a motorcycle suddenly drove past and nearly hit her, causing Allison to shreik and stumble backwards....

....And for her coke to splash right on Stiles' shirt....

"Aww MAN!" he groaned

"Oh Stiles... I'm so sorry!" Allison winced, taking a step forward and starting to pat him down with some napkins

"It isn't your fault, it's the jerk on the bike's! This ... is not going to sit well..."

He was _drenched_ and he was somehow supposed to walk around in this for the next several hours!?

Coke + heat + sweat = A tornado of bad

"You need to get out of that shirt," Kira said quickly

"Yeah.... these napkins really aren't working," Allison, sighed, tossing a wad of them to the side and starting to pat around the top of his jeans

He hadn't thought it really splashed there but whatever, he was _soaked_ and she could obviously see spots where he couldn't...

"Come on, let's go clean you up, there's a souvenir stand right around the corner, we'll get you a new shirt," Kira encouraged politely

Stiles heaved a loud sigh, but he knew there was nothing he could do about it...

He just really didn't relish the idea of blowing $20 on a (likely Blue Eyes themed) t-shirt that he didn't really care to have, but ... better than becoming a feast for the bees he supposed

"Ok... I'm finishing my freaking hot dog on the way there but ok,"

"Ofcourse," Kira smiled, patting Stiles' back gently and smiling sympathetically at Allison as the curly-haired brunette finally stepped back, wadding up some more napkins and tossing them aside as well

"I'll go get another coke and find a place to sit down for when you guys get back," she volunteered, giving Kira a thumb's up before turning away and starting off in a different direction

However, by the time she had gotten out of ear-shot of Kira and Stiles, something- or rather someone- interrupted her mission

"Hey Argent, fancy meeting you here,"

Glancing up, Allison immediately frowned at the woman in front of her

"Cora Hale... finally get out of that hellicoptor did you?"

Cora shrugged, smirking at her as she stepped closer

"I hope you brought your lucky dice, you're going to need them,"

"Sorry, not interested, I'm supposed to be meeting a freind," Allison glared back

"You're denying my challenge? What, my star chips aren't good enough for you? C'mon... one more that'll stroke your ego?" she grinned, showing off her seven-starred gauntlet

"Or maybe my rarest card will get your attention," she suggested, drawing a card off the top of her deck and flashing it in front of the Dice Queen

"You have one of your brother's Blue Eyes?" she breathed

Blue Eyes White Dragon... one of the rarest cards in the entire game, with only three left in the entire world, and Derek Hale owned all of them

He _treasured_ those cards... and he was putting one up for wager?

"Yep, on loan _just_ for you, Derek has other, rarer cards, but none nearly so sentimental... so he gave one of these to me on the happenstance that I would see you, figuring you might want to take something else near and dear to his heart,"

Allison gritted her teeth

"I had nothing to do with that Cora, you and Derek both know that... but I'm in, how could I ever resist the opportunity to get my hands on a Blue Eyes?"

"That's right... the Argents had a love affair with these cards too didn't you? Too bad that's one battle you're destined to always lose," Cora smirked, shuffling the Blue Eyes back into her deck and sliding the deck back into her disk

"Are you ready yet?" Allison snapped, her duel disk activating as she set down the half-empty bottle of coke and got into a more battle appropriate position

"I am, just hope you'll be able to function without holding onto those lucky dice,"

"Oh, I don't need to hold the dice to get the luck," Allison smirked, combing a few strands of hair behind her ear to reveal a dangling dice earring

"I've always got it with me,"

 

~+~

 

Stiles didn't know what the hell had happened

One minute he was complaining about getting ahold of- he guessed it- a Blue Eyes t-shirt- the guy at the stand promised other designs would be available by the time Monster Land opened but that they only had the bare bones right now, Stiles was convinced the Blue Eyes being the only design available wasn't a coincidence- and the next he and Kira had gone looking for Allison...

Only to find her neck and neck in a battle with Cora Hale

And they were _really_ neck and neck, each down to only 400 life points, and each with only one monster on the feild

And the attack points were only different by 300 in Cora's favor

But it was Allison's turn and he wasn't prepared to count her out just yet

"Now I activate my magic card- Change Of Heart, allowing me to take control of your Winged Dragon Guardian Of The Fortress! And once I have him, I'll attack your life points directly and finish this duel!"

"Not so fast," Cora smirked wickedly

"Reveal face-down card! Lord Of Summoning Dragons!"

Stiles felt his heart sink

Lord Of Summoning Dragons....

Unless Allison had a truly miraculous backup plan, she was done for...

"When Lord Of Summoning Dragons is on the feild, all dragon monsters are immune to spell cards, except ofcourse for the one I placed on the feild earlier... now activate! Flute Of Summoning Dragons, wich will allow me to summon up to two dragons from my hand,"

"No...." Allison hissed, bracing herself and gritting her teeth

"Oh yes, thanks to my flute, I can summon my brother's Blue Eyes without having to sacrifice any monsters, and with three thousand attack points, my dragon can easily take down your Amazon Tigress- AND deplete your life points,"

Stiles couldn't believe what he was watching, the Blue Eyes White Dragon in ultra high definition holographic form.... it was breath-taking and stunning, it was majestic, like a god that required worship... and it was about to destroy his freind...

"Now Blue Eyes, White Lightening attack!!"

And sure enough, just as Cora had predicted, Allison's tiger was obliterated, and her life points ticked down to zero

She had lost....

And to _Cora Hale_

Cora wasn't a bad dueler, but in comparison to the rest of them she was the least experienced and cared the least about the game, she had always been more focused on the technology aspect of her family's company, where Derek had been more concentrated on the gaming aspect

For her to have taken down Allison...

"As happy as it makes me to watch you lose, I have things to do, so.... chip and card please," Cora said easily, holding her hand out

Allison looked like she was in physical pain when she plucked a star chip out of her gauntlet and handed it over, but she looked like she was in _agony_ when she pulled out her deck and yanked out a card to hand over along with it

"Thank you," Cora smirked, turning around and smiling a little bit brighter

"I have places to be, right Derek?"

_Derek?_

Spinning on his heel, Stiles saw that, indeed, the older Hale had been watching for atleast the last few minutes, a light but confident smile on his face as his sister hurried to his side

"That's right," he confirmed

"With eight star chips, I only need five more to get a place in the finals, and I'm not interested in waiting around," she added a second later

"Eight chips already? So what's the deal Derek? Hales start off with extra chips or what?" Stiles frowned

That seemed to irk both Cora and Derek as they turned around, offended looks on their faces

"Are you trying to insinuate that I didn't EARN my chips?" Cora hissed

"Sorry, is that what it sounded like? I'm only saying that I can't understand the point in entering your own tournament, not unless you were going after something specific, and if you were going after something specific, why not give yourselves an advantage to get there?"

Derek gritted his teeth, looking utterly and truly upset by this

"We play by the same rules that you do, believe me, Cora has _earned_ her eight chips, and I've earned my ten,"

Ten!?

"You.... already have ten?" Kira breathed

Derek only shrugged, seeming utterly unimpressed

"We have things to do, come on Cora," he said simply

Cora nodded, fastening her newest star chip into her gauntlet and... handing her new card to Derek....

"I want my Blue Eyes back by the way," Derek noted as they walked, Stiles couldn't hear what Cora's response to that was, but he was watching closely and... Derek didn't put the new card in his deck

He didn't even look at it, he just put it in his pocket....

"Allison... what card did you wager?" Stiles frowned, immediately turning back towards her

Something was going on here and he needed to know what it was, and judging by the look on Allison's face... she could atleast fill in a few blanks

"It... was called _Dice Dungeon_ ,"

" _Dice Dungeon_?" Stiles repeated

"Isn't that alot like-"

"Dungeon Dice? Yeah, there's a reason for that,"

Allison swallowed tightly, taking her dice out of her pocket and starting to toss them aimlessly in the air, kind of like how some people would with a ball or a coin

"My grandfather and my aunt Kate... they got the inspiration for Dungeon Dice from a group of cards the Hales were working on, they weren't stolen or anything, and the cards weren't even trademarked yet, but ... they were officially playable in tournaments, the Hales registered them before getting the trademark, when my grandfather and aunt stumbled across the first copies they liked them so much that they based their own game around them- Dungeon Dice Monsters, after that we trademarked the names, the powers, all of it, but the physical cards still belonged to the Duel Monsters game since that's where they were registered, we couldn't really trademark the cards themselves because of that so these are the only copies in existence, they're precious family heirlooms and most of them were stolen a couple of months ago, all except for four- the one I have in my deck, the one we gave to Scott for becoming the first Dungeon Dice champion, and two that my dad had under lock and key, he gave those to me a few weeks ago for the tournament and I gave one to Lydia and the other to Scott, but the rest are gone... my dad is going to kill me for losing that card... I have to get it back,"

She paused, shoving her dice back in her pocket and de-activating her duel disk

"I'm going to find Lydia, I'll see you guys later?"

"Yeah, we'll see you," Kira agreed quietly, waving as Allison walked away

Stiles didn't wave though, Stiles was ... _angry_

" _Family heirlooms_?" he spat

"Yeah, to the _Hales_ , they stole those cards... they stole the entire IDEA..."

No wonder Derek had been so cold to them lately...

Stiles remembered what Derek was like before he and Cora became the last survivors of the Hale clan, he had always been kind of egotistical about Duel Monsters but he was never like this, never cold or stand-offish, just .. kind of cocky

And considering he was a region champion, he had every right to be

After his family died though he shut down, he became quiet and withdrawn, but he was still nice, in his own ways.....

Until Duelist Kingdom

The international championship that happened just under two years ago

That was the first time Derek had ever lost a duel- atleast to public knowledge, and it had been to Scott

Scott's boss at the time, Deaton, had given him a set of Exodia cards- a monster powerfull enough to take down all of Derek's dragons- and Scott had put them to use too, blowing Derek to smithereens

Right after that Derek had started acting differently

He wasn't just withdrawn now, he was cold and cruel, biting at all of them every chance he got and always acting like they were about to cut his hand off whenever they came near him

Stiles had assumed it was because of the duel but... now that he thought about it, they had met Allison on that trip

She and Scott had hit it off right away and she had been with them on the ferry ride to the tournament island, where Scott and Derek had played pre-tournament

After that Scott's Exodia cards had been stolen and in the struggle to get them back they plunged into the sea, but that hadn't stopped Scott from beating Derek a second time in the official Duelist Kingdom finals, when he had won thanks to.... a card Allison gave him before the game....

Scott had beaten Derek a second time- with Allison's help, with a card SHE gave him

And only a few months after that, the first Dungeon Dice arena opened and Scott became known as the Dungeon Dice champion

When that arena opened Derek had practically _begged_ Scott not to play, but he not only entered the tournament, he _won_ , and ever since has been hailed as the king of not only Duel Monsters, but Dungeon Dice as well

At the time Stiles just thought Derek was jealous about a new competitor and wanted to flush them out of the gaming industry, but now he understood how personal it all was

When Scott played the dice game, he wasn't just betraying Duel Monsters, he was betraying Derek _personally_

Sure the two of them had never been the closest freinds but they were atleast mostly civil to eachother, and Derek was the one who had convinced Duelist Kingdom to let Scott and Stiles participate in the tournament without having any prior credentials in the first place

If Derek hadn't done that, then not only would neither of them be where they are as duelists now, but Scott and Allison probably never would have met....

Stiles would bet anything that Derek thinks about that day and night, and all of a sudden, he felt sick to his stomach

"Stiles?"

Blinking out of his stupor to look down at Kira's concerned face, he forced a smile and took in a deep breath to compose himself

"Sorry Kira, what did you say?"

"I said that I think we need to find Scott,"

"Yeah..." Stiles agreed slowly, his fingers twitching with frustration as they started walking again

"I was just about to suggest the same thing,"

 

~+~

 

By the time they found Scott, Stiles was up to six star chips, Kira up to seven, and the sun was starting to set

Not bad odds really but Stiles was still in a pretty sour mood, everything about the encounter with Allison and Cora had just rubbed him the wrong way and now he wasn't really sure what to do with himself

"Scott!!"

Kira, as always, was excited to see her boyfreind, racing up to him, looping her arms around him and giving him a kiss

Stiles would have liked to share the enthusiasm but just... couldn't bring himself to

Not with the memory of Allison's words haunting his mind like they did

"How many chips are you up to? Stiles has six, I have seven,"

"Nine," Scott smiled proudly, showing off his gauntlet to an amazed Kira

Stiles was impressed too, even for someone of Scott's level that wasn't an easy feat...

But any pride he usually would have felt was just... so clouded by this entire scandal with Dungeon Dice, he didn't know how to process anything else

"Four more and you'll have a spot in the finals," Kira beamed

"I know! We all seem to be doing pretty well, I haven't talked to Malia yet but last I saw of Lydia and Allison they were doing great,"

"Allison actually is down to five, or was about two hours ago anyway," Stiles piped in emotionlessly

".. What?"

"She lost a duel, anyway, speaking of Allison, did you know about the original Dungeon Dice cards belonging to the Hales?"

Scott looked so sincerely confused by that that Stiles had to believe he was just out of the loop, wich atleast gave him one SHRED of faith left in humanity

"What? What are you talking about...?"

"Kira will fill you in later, anyway, can I see your Dice cards? The ones from Allison?"

Looking even more confused than before, Scott nodded in agreement and took his deck out of his duel disk, fanning the cards out and easily locating his two Dice cards

Just as Stiles suspected...

_Dice Hearts_ and _Summoning Dice_ were in the exact same style and theme as the card he had won from his first duel of the day- _Destiny Dice_

Meaning he had one of the rarest cards on earth sitting in his deck- a card that didn't rightfully belong to him....

"Thanks, I'll see you two later ok?"

"Wait, where are you going?" Kira frowned

"Aren't you the one who wanted to stick together? And now that we're so much closer to winning-"

"I know, I just need to do something first, but I'll be back later ok? Promise,"

He didn't wait for them to respond, he just knew that he had a mission

He couldn't concentrate on the tournament until he had this all figured out, and that meant one thing: Finding Derek

 

~+~

 

An hour into it, Stiles ended up coming across another duelist with a Dice card, and, naturally, upon finding this out, he had to duel him

The battle hadn't been that difficult in all honesty, it had wrapped quickly enough, and Stiles came away with it richer by one star chip and one Dice card

But he still hadn't found Derek so it was a hollow victory

It took him another three barely-usefull battles before he got a lead, and luckily, just as he was starting to give up, he happened across someone that could help him out

"Lydia!"

The strawberry-blonde that he had (literally) run into look entirely unimpressed as she brushed dirt off of her skirt and stood up, glaring daggers at him

"Is there something you need?"

"Actually... kinda, you wouldn't happen to have seen Derek Hale around here at any point would you?"

" _Seen_ him? I've been _outrunning_ him for the past two hours, I finally lost him to a duelist challenging him over by the house of mirrors but I'm sure it's only a matter of time before he gets back,"

"Thanks for the info, but... why is Derek Hale chasing you?" Stiles frowned in confusion

"I have a card he wants," she shrugged easily

Oh, right.... Derek was probably trying to track down anyone who had one of the Dice cards, that must have been why he registered everyone's decks when they signed up...

"How does he know you still have it though?"

"Well eleven chips doesn't exactly say 'loser' now does it?"

"Fair poi- wait... ELEVEN!?"

Stiles had been impressed with NINE, but Lydia only needed two more to qualify for the finals and it had just gotten dark!

Maybe it wasn't Scott he needed to be looking out for in the finals after all....

"Don't act so surprised, and besides, to better answer your question, all rare cards are registered on someone's duel disk once they hit the feild, so if someone else was using my card, it would pop up on Derek's duel disk and he'd know, duel disks also have trackers in them, they say that's for the safety of their participants but I'm pretty sure it's just so Hale can track down whoever has a card he wants and challenge them before they lose it to someone else,"

That... actually made a ton of sense...

"How do you know all that?"

"I battled a techy, I bargained to let him keep his stuff in exchange for telling me about the inner workings of the disks, something felt off about these from the moment I picked one up, it was worth it,"

So Lydia would actually have TWELVE star chips if she hadn't made that deal...

_Way to make me feel incompetent Lyds..._

"Thanks for the help,"

"No problem, but do me a favor in return? If you DO run into Derek, keep him distracted for a wile ok? It isn't that I mind dueling him, I just have a very specific card that I need to get first and I only know of one person I can get it from,"

"Oh believe me," Stiles grinned

"If I get a hold of Derek Hale, he'll be distracted from _everything_ that isn't me for atleast a few hours,"

Atleast.... provided Stiles' plan worked, that is....

 

~+~

 

Stiles had watched Derek duel before

What he _hadn't_ watched was Derek dueling, up close- only a few feet away- with his Blue Eyes White Dragon, on such an incredibly high-definition hologram projector before

There was no other word than "enchanting" that could fit what Stiles was witnessing

It was almost heart-stopping, seeing the power of the dragon, seeing the pride on Derek's face, he was close enough that he could see the dragon "breathing" and he was... mesmerized....

"Now my Blue Eyes, attack his Kaiser Sea Horse and end this duel for good," Derek smirked

Stiles felt sorry for the poor guy on the receiving end of that attack, Stiles had been in that guy's shoes before and it was _not_ a fun place to be

As the life point counter hit zero and the holograms disappeared, however, Stiles took a few steps back, not wanting to be noticed right away as Derek collected his winnings- a star chip, and a rare card

"My rarest card is Time Wizard, I'm sure it isn't much to you but-"

"But it means alot to you," Derek interrupted, taking the card and hesitating for a moment before slowly handing it back

"I already have a few Time Wizards, there's no need to add it to my collection when it'd be much better served in your's,"

The stranger stared up at Derek as if he had just presented him with some ultimate gift- .. wich.. he sorta did..- and beamed from ear to ear

"Thank you! Thank you Mr. Hale!!"

Derek only shrugged, looking warm for about two seconds before his face turned to something more serious

"Make no mistake though, if you tell anyone? They'll never find your body,"

That had been all the stranger needed to hear before rushing to his feet and heading for the hills as fast as he could

It was kind of amusing to watch Derek threaten people that weren't Stiles for once, to be honest...

"I know you're there Stiles," Derek said suddenly, not even turning around as he secured the new star chip in his gauntlet

"If you came here to duel I'm going to have to decline, I'm on a tight schedule, I'll make you miserable on another day,"

"I'm not here for a duel, I'm here to give you something," Stiles frowned, taking a few steps closer

"You don't have anything I want,"

"Really? 'Cause I'm pretty sure you'd want these,"

The moment Derek turned around, he caught sight of the set of Dice cards in Stiles' hands, his eyes started to widen, mouth falling open, before shifting his gaze from the cards to Stiles' face

"How- ... I ... I don't understand..."

"Well, this one I just won before meeting you but the first.. I've had it all day, it hasn't hit your radar for being mine yet because I haven't played it, something just felt.... off... about it, so I kept it at the bottom of my deck and never played it, and ofcourse now I know WHY something felt so off about it... Allison told me the story, or atleast part of it, about Dungeon Dice and the cards.... these are your's, Derek," he insisted, gently holding the cards out further

"They aren't mine, they aren't Allison's, they aren't anyone's but your's and you shouldn't have to throw a tournament to win back your own property,"

Derek swallowed tightly, his lips pursing as he slowly reached out and took the cards, staring down at them for a long, silent moment as Stiles spoke again

"I'm sorry, for the record, about... ya' know... all of it? I mean maybe the duels couldn't have been helped, Allison is our freind no matter what her parents or grandparents or creepy aunt did, but ... if I'd understood why you were so intent on us not going near Dungeon Dice, I would have made sure Scott never laid his finger on a die, you have my word for that, I'm just sorry it took so long for it to get here,"

He shook his head slowly, taking a deep breath and pulling his deck out of his duel disk

"Thank you Stiles... now, pick two of my cards- any two, they're your's,"

Stiles frowned, shaking his head and putting a hand over Derek's

"I'm not trading you back your own property Derek, hell it isn't even a GIFT, I'm just... returning it to where it belongs,"

Derek's lips twitched up just slightly, eyes sparkling a little as he brushed Stiles' hand aside

"And I'm not trading or gifting anything to you either, this is a reward, for returning my stolen property,"

Stiles blinked, staring down at Derek's hand for a breif moment and observing what cards he had on him

Derek was a serious collector- obviously- and always reinventing his deck, so he almost always had a different deck by the time they met up, but his cards were always top-of-the-line high-end so any of them would be good

....

But....

"What if, instead of your cards, I want something else from you in return for returning your stolen property?"

"Such as?" Derek asked with raised eyebrows

"Information, you answer two questions I have with complete and total honesty, no lies, no cheats, no screwing around... and that'll be my reward, what do you say?"

Derek was quiet for a few moments before giving a slow nod as agreement, much to Stiles' delight

"Fine, but first... we're going to get something to eat, it's been a wile since lunch,"

Stiles smirked, gently patting Derek on the back as they walked

"A man after my own heart,"

 

~+~

 

"I cannot believe you, you have duel monster shaped ice cream on a stick?"

"This is a duel monster theme park," Derek frowned

That wasn't an excuse

That was _not_ an excuse

"Yeah but dude..... _come on_ ,"

Derek only shrugged, setting some food down on the picnic table in front of them, half for Stiles, half for himself, and sliding onto the bench

"I promised you two questions, so you'd better ask them before I change my mind and just toss some cards at you,"

And knowing Derek, that was a serious possibility....

"Do you really think that I'm a terrible duelist?" Stiles asked quietly, wich seemed to take Derek by surprise

He wasn't sure if it was because Derek had expected something else, or ... just because he hadn't expected _that_ , but he seemed thoroughly alarmed

"If you do, then what do I have to do to prove to you that I'm on your level? And if you don't, then why do you keep saying it? Why did you try to disuade me from joining your tournament? Why are you always treating me like I am?"

Derek inhaled through his nose, exhaled through his mouth, and shifted on the bench, slowly grabbing a few ketchup packets from beside him and starting to open them one by one

"I don't think you're a terrible duelist Stiles, I haven't thought that for a long time,"

"Like... since last year?"

"Since we were kids,"

... _Oh_

"Then why the hell-"

"Because I keep hoping that if I discourage you enough, you'll take a step back and not get so immersed in it like Scott did, ofcourse I realize now that the more I discourage you, the more you burry yourself in the game to spite me,"

"Well, more prove you wrong but... yeah, ok, I can work with spite," Stiles smirked back, taking a sip of his coke

"I should have known early on that I would get better results from you with honey than vinegar- if I wanted you to stop, that is, vinegar seems to be a pretty good motivator for you though," Derek noted teasingly

"Yeah, I went three months without cleaning my room once, my dad tried _everything_ to motivate me to do it but it wasn't until he said that I just didn't know how to be organized that I got up and did it- and after that, I reorganized the kitchen,"

"You know, somehow, that doesn't surprise me at all," Derek snorted, picking up a french fry from the basket next to him and dragging it through the ketchup

"I figured it wouldn't," Stiles smirked back, but the grin died a second later, a much more serious expression coming across his face as he reached for a french fry of his own

"I don't get it though, if you think I'm a good duelist then why would you keep trying to discourage me from being in competitions? I mean, Dungeon Dice I get- and apologize for, thoroughly- but ... Duelist Kingdom and Monster Land... why wouldn't you want me participating?"

"Because these competitions are more dangerous than you think, I don't want you to get hurt Stiles,"

"What's dangerous about participating in a _card game_? It's literally a _children's card game_ Derek," Stiles frowned with confusion

Derek looked uncomfortable with the very _idea_ of answering that question, before heaving a quiet sigh and shifting again

"Is that your second question?"

Crap... Stiles had been hoping he wouldn't ask that...

"No," he decided after a beat, grabbing another fry

"I .... want you to tell me everything about this tournament- _everything_ , your real goals, the story behind those cards- from your mouth, not Allison's- the so-called dangers of it... I want to know all of it,"

"Are you really considering that a question?" Derek frowned skeptickally

"Ok, want it in the form of a question Alex? What is there to know about this competition that I don't already know?"

"That's an awfully big question,"

"Yeah well, you didn't put a size limit on it so it's a little late for take-backsies,"

Derek seemed to be in agreement, if the frustrated look on his face was anything to go by, and that boded well for Stiles' odds here

"It's a long story, do you really want to hear it?" he finally asked, grabbing the garden salad from beside him- sidenote: The fact that Derek Hale was eating a _garden salad_....- and a fork

"I wouldn't have asked if I didn't,"

For a moment, Derek didn't speak, he didn't move, he just... stared listlessly down at the table, lost in his own thoughts, before finally starting to speak again

"I.. guess I should begin at the beginning,"

Stiles was quiet, for once, utterly quiet

He could tell that for whatever reason, talking about all of this seemed to be ... painfull for Derek, and it hurt him to see the older man aching like this, but he needed to know

He _needed_ to know

"The Argents and my family have always had a very intense... rivalry, I guess is a word for it, long before we got into the gaming industry, I'm not exaggerating when I say that our families have been enemies for a few hundred years,"

Stiles paused, mouth on his straw, practically choking from that information

....

Well, there went his assumption that this began with the dice thing...

"When we _did_ take ownership of Duel Monsters and start developing the game and the technology for it, it was like someone lit a flame in an already warm pot, it brought the feud up from a heat to a boil, and they started looking for everything they could to bring down not only our family, but our company, even the game it's self, it didn't sit well with them that we were finally on the same financial playing feild, and when we surpassed them... it really came to a heat,"

"Wait... what do you mean _take ownership of_? Didn't you... _create_ it?"

"That's another, longer story, do you want to hear that one or do you want to hear about the tournament?"

Stiles really hated these ultimatums...

"Tournament," he decided with a frown, taking a bite of his cheeseburger

"Right... well, the Argents tried for several years to find a way to take down Hale Corp, everything from 'accidents' involving our offices and employees to stealing information to spreading false rumors to turn people away from us, remember that thing from about ten years ago, about my family disturbing an ancient Egyptian tomb?"

"That was the Argents?" Stiles asked in shock

He had never thought that they would stoop to such low- or .. frankly weird- levels and yet...

"Yeah.... for a wile, a long wile, my family managed to avoid any real damage, but then they... sunk even lower,"

"Lower than fake tomb robbing scandals?"

That was actually kind of hard to believe...

"Before my family died, they had started working on the Dice cards, the rules were all laid out, the designs were done, but they hadn't been trademarked yet, my mom- the president of the company- was in the process of doing that at the time... it was over winter holidays and the trademarking offices were closed sporadically over the weeks, so she decided to register the cards in the official dueling database wile she waited for them to be open consistently again, Mom was always thinking ahead that way... but.. over those same holidays, my family's house burned down, and everyone inside it, Cora and I were the only ones who weren't home, because I was at my last state-wide Junior Dueling Championships, I wanted to go alone because I had been worried about relying too much on my family for support when under pressure, but Cora had begged to come with me so she could watch me win the tournament, she was planning to enter her first one the next year so I reluctantly agreed, when I got home with the trophy, everyone and everything was gone,"

Stiles remembered that night

The event had been televised, he had been so excited for Derek- who he, admittedly, only barely knew through being in the same town, but who he greatly admired

It was right after the television spot ended and the eleven o'clock news started that the word about the Hale fire came out

"The thing is... my parents were prepared for their deaths, but they weren't prepared for my _sister's_ death, they had all kinds of papperwork and official documents in Laura's name because they assumed she would be the natural successor of the company, if anything ever happened to them they wanted her to be able to take over the next morning, they didn't ever think that she would die along with them... it took two months before I could even get the key to my mom's office, and getting the company in my name, gaining control, it ... it was like swimming up a waterfall... there was internal conflict, court dates that got pushed around, a board that didn't believe in me, and ofcourse a problem with a 17-year-old owning a multi-billion dollar company by himself-"

"Did you say _billion_? With... with a **_B_**??"

"For two months the company essentially had no owner, and... the cards went untrademarked, by the time I got into my mom's office the cards were gone, and six months later Dungeon Dice Monsters was announced, I eventually found out that one of the board advisers had sold the card prototypes to the Argents but because they weren't trademarked and any official documents hadn't been transferred into my name yet it was completely legal, so the cards were officially the Argents' to keep, but they were still registered in the Duel Monsters database, so they could be used both in the Duel Monsters game _and_ in the Dungeon Dice game,"

"That's why they offered one of the cards as a prize in their first tournament.... to lure in rare card collectors and serious duelists to play their game..." Stiles muttered quietly

The more Derek spoke, the sicker he felt, and the idea that the Argents had used the deaths of a child's family to win a petty rivalry made him want to either burst into tears... or go on a killing spree

"Exactly, I never removed the cards from the database because I couldn't bring myself to, they were the last thing my parents- my _mom_ \- worked on... how could I stand to watch them be deleted and fully given to our competitors? I vowed to get the cards back, for my mom, my parents... my family... but I wasn't going to resort to anything underhanded to do it, then Duelist Kingdom started up and I ended up hearing through the grapevine that the Argents were going to offer one of the cards as a prize in their upcoming dice tournament, I decided then to start working on the amusement park and use it as an excuse to hold my own tournament, hoping to lure the winner of the dice game out and get their card, it was only one, sure, but it was a start, then my luck suddenly started to change, a few months after the Dice tournament, the other cards were all stolen, I modified my tournament so that I could lure in the theives and get the cards from them,"

"So that's why you have all these precautions, not to make it a hard tournament, but to keep the theives from doing any more damage than they already did,"

"Basically, yes,"

"Why a theme park though? I just have to ask,"

"Cora wanted one when she was a kid.... we'd talked about building one, then when Dungeon Dice appeared and had the big flashy stadiums I proposed the idea of the amusement park to my board of directors and CEOs as a marketing ploy, it'd keep people interested in Duel Monsters and away from Dungeon Dice, if they went to a Disneylnad-esque place they'd want to buy cards and duel disks and the like wile they're here, that would encourage them to keep playing, and offering tickets and annual passes as tournament prizes will keep people entering, plus, this way even people who aren't interested in Duel Monsters will choose Monsters over Dice, if they come here for the rides and the games then when presented with the opportunity of cards or dice they'll choose cards and won't bother with the Argents' game, and each new attraction that opens here will spawn a new wave of card sales, we're also looking at a virtual reality theme park for players, if they enjoy this place they may be more tempted to take a leap for a more expensive trip to one of the VR parks,"

Stiles was ... stunned, in all honesty

He had just thought the park was a not-quite-cheap marketing gimmick, but when Derek put it like that, it didn't really sound gimmicky anymore....

"That's.... honestly incredible,"

"Thanks,"

Stiles nodded, picking at his food, having somewhat lost his appetite after hearing about how things had gone down between the Hales and the Argents

"That's also why you have your own employees and your sister in the tournament, right? To help ensure that you ultimately end up with all the cards without having to duel every single possessor yourself?"

"That's right, but I make sure to keep it fair, if they didn't play by the exact same rules as everyone else, we'd be nothing but theives,"

Stiles disagreed

There was nothing- in his opinion- wrong with stealing back your own property, or even just giving yourself a small advantage to win back your own property fairly, but...

That was the Derek Hale he knew so well, the one who would spite himself to keep things squeaky clean and fair, even in filthy circumstances like these

"And getting to the finals.... that's to face Scott right? To be sure that you get his cards?"

"Mm... some yes, but .... I do have other motives for that, the cards aren't all I want from Scott McCall and he isn't the only one who I suspect will be in the finals who I need,"

"Care to elaborate?"

"Not unless you have another Dice card,"

Ofcourse, what did Stiles expect?

"What about the star chips? I've been wondering.. how are you ensuring that each person only gets one chip per duel?"

"The gauntlets," Derek explained, reaching across the table to gently take Stiles' hand- and.. that kind of made his heart stutter, he didn't know Derek could _be_ that gentle- and carefully running his fingertips across the star chips embedded in the metal ring around his glove

"Each chip is digitized to recognize the computer chip in the gauntlets-"

"There are computer chips in here!?"

"There are computer chips in everything,"

Stiles frowned, staring down at his food with mild concern

"... ALMOST everything," Derek corrected, tapping the glove slightly to regain the other's attention

"Each gauntlet is registered to a particular user just like the duel disks, and each gauntlet has it's own unique digital fingerprint, once a chip touches the gauntlet it absorbs the code of that fingerprint,"

"So if someone has three chips with the same fingerprints-"

"They're breaking rules, and the chips record an entire _record_ of gauntlet prints, so there's no real way to fool the system by breifly inserting a chip in your freind's gauntlet before your own, when you win thirteen and put them in the machine to get your entry card, it reads those fingerprints, and if it picks up cheating, you'll get a fake card sending you to our security office instead,"

"Wow.... that's.... wow...."

To say Stiles was impressed with the system was putting it mildly, he wondered if Derek had ever thought about going into the CIA or something, because that was freaking NEXT. LEVEL...

"Thanks," Derek smirked, hesitantly letting go of Stiles' wrist

"I noticed alot of stealing and bullying at Duelist Kingdom and didn't want that here,"

"Well, I think it's safe to say that that was a success on your part,"

"I hope so," Derek said quietly

"My mom always told me that what separated us from the Argents was how we played the game, if we play fairly we'll always be better than them, even if we lose, I.... would never want to stoop to their level, so fair gameplay became ... like a mantra of mine,"

"Well for the record, I think you're doing pretty well at it," he smiled gently, reaching out to carefully pat Derek on the shoulder

"Thanks," he said quietly, smiling faintly at him

"Yeah, ofcourse, so uh... how many of these special dice cards are there?"

"Twelve,"

"Twelve cards, twelve chips minimum to be earned to advanced.. makes sense, how many cards do you have?"

"Including the two you gave me, six,"

"Scott has two and Lydia has one so that's nine... so we only need to locate three more,"

"Define 'we'," Derek frowned

"Well Derek, how else am I going to get more questions out of you? You DID say that if I wanted more answers I should give you more cards," Stiles winked, rising from the table

"I wasn't being serious Stiles, listen to me, you need to stop hunting the Dice cards, just focus on getting your star chips so you can go to the finals, don't bother with the cards,"

"Too late, you made the offer, I'm gonna cash in," he grinned, adjusting his duel disk before taking a step away from the table

"I'll see you again soon Derek, hopefully with another Dice card," he promised, before taking off suddenly into the park, despite Derek's protests

The older duelist snarled in frustration, rubbing his forehead and tapping into the micro-communicator he kept hooked into his ear for emergencies

"Cora... I need you to do me a favor, get me my motorcycle, and track Stiles Stilinski's duel disk,"

 

~+~

 

In retrospect, he really shouldn't have just taken off without atleast taking his soda with him

Stiles wasn't out of shape _per se_ but running always exhausted him and made him feel dehydrated, now he was hot and sweaty and thirsty and cokeless

Luckily there was a soda machine not far from where he was standing now, over by the Blue Eyes rollercoaster, so he could get some water or something, he just hoped he had enough quarters or a few dollar bills so he could work the machine...

He should have some loose change in his pocket, he knew he didn't have the right kind in his wallet...

So, sticking his hand in his pocket, he started rooting around for some quarters, when he felt something.. odd...

Frowning, he grasped the contents in his hand and yanked it out, eyebrows raising when he found a card and some kind of necklace...

Scrunching up his face, he took a step under one of the various duel monster shaped street lamps to get a better look at it

_Beta Dice_

Beta Dice...?

Well, obviously it was a Dice card- not that he knew how it got in his pocket but it clearly matched with the others- it was just.... confusing....

What the hell did Beta Dice mean?

The picture wasn't very helpfull either, it just had a yellow die on it, kinda plain in all honesty....

Even more confusing though was the necklace, it was silver and had a triskelion pendant on it but... that was it...

Oh well, he could figure it out later, right now he needed to concentrate on getting the rest of the Dice cards and star chips he needed

He had another card, that meant that they only had to find two more now, and he wanted to atleast _try_ to find them before running into Derek again

So he put the card back in his pocket, not wanting it in his deck just in case he lost his next duel and had to give up his rarest card

Sure it would mean shifting that status back onto his Red Eyes but... Derek was alot more important than a card, no matter how much that card meant to him

Now back to looking for some spare change...

"Excuse me!"

Blinking in surprise, Stiles turned around and stared at the man who had suddenly appeared behind him

He had blonde hair, bright eyes, and an innocent looking smile on his face, but... Stiles wasn't too sure how innocent it _actually_ was, something about him seemed a little off

He was a duelist- as evidenced by the gauntlet and duel disk- and seemed to be .. _relieved_ to see Stiles for some reason

"Do you want to duel? I've been looking for someone for almost an hour now, I guess now that the competition is starting to thin out it's getting harder to find opponents, you know? Anyway, do you want to have a match?"

Well, the water could wait he supposed, he had an opponent right here willing and able and he could use the star chip, and who knows? Maybe he had one of the Dice cards

"Yeah, ok, sounds good," Stiles agreed, hand leaving his pocket as he flexed his fingers out and started walking forward

"Here good?"

"Actually... I was thinking we could go to the haunted house right up there? It has much better lighting, and it's a little warmer, I don't know about you but I'm kinda cold out here,"

Cold? It was mid-summer in California

Personally Stiles couldn't understand how Derek was always wearing his ridiculously elaborate coats and jackets in this weather, especially since he knew for a FACT that Derek had like... _extreme_ body heat

He didn't get it...

But then he did run cold himself on occasion so maybe this guy just had virtually no body heat, that wasn't unreasonable

Unlikely, but not unreasonable

It was enough to make Stiles suspicious but not enough to ward him off completely

Not yet anyway...

"Sure, we can do that," he agreed with a nod

"Great! I'm Theo by the way, what's your name?"

"Stiles, nice to meet you Theo,"

It was definitely nice to get another duelist that introduced themselves upon agreeing to battle, they didn't all do that, and especially with it being so late in the evening now, people were starting to get tired and frustrated and formalities and greetings were the last things on their minds, especially when they had so much of their attention focused on things like star chips...

"Nice to meet you too, how many chips are you up to now?" Theo asked, starting to walk towards the haunted house

"Ten, you?"

"Oh wow, ten huh? That's great! Just three more and you'll be in the finals, I'm up to twelve myself, so if I defeat you I'll get a guranteed spot,"

"Oh yeah? Well as much as I'd like to just give you your last star chip, I haven't been beaten yet, so you'll really have to work for it," Stiles teased

"Ooh I don't have any problem with that at all," Theo smirked back, stepping into the Fortune Spirit & Haunted Mansion haunted house- _seriously_ the amount of duel monster references...-

"Good to know," Stiles said with false confidence

He wasn't worried about losing to Theo, but he wasn't necessarily sure that he was ultimately going to battle Theo either

Something about all of this seemed kind of odd, and Stiles wasn't entirely sure if he should run or not...

He needed the star chip though, and the potential that Theo had one of the cards he was looking for was pretty high, considering the level of skeevy, but still...

Something felt wrong- _bad_ wrong, way worse than the other card holders he had played against

He swallowed tightly as they walked through the haunted house, carefully shifting his hand against the arm guard of his duel disk and feeling his fingers around against the bottom

According to Erica, they had installed an emergency silent alarm in all disks in case of emergency

_"You see this red button underneath the wing? If you ever get into trouble, just press that button, and believe me, someone will be there in less than three minutes, no matter where you are in the park,"_

He swallowed tightly, his fingers hovering slightly over the security button, getting ready to press down

As confident as he was that Theo could give him a much needed star chip and Dice card, it really wasn't worth risking his life, and this guy was giving him all sorts of _body in the basement_ vibes

"Are you sure we're in the right place? I don't feel any warmer and I don't see any lights, it might not be good dueling conditions," he frowned

The haunted house was dark and somewhat cramped, offline anamatronics and creepy scenery and props laid out everywhere, kinda giving it a Five Nights At Freddy's vibe...

He _definitely_ wanted to leave...

"Actually Stiles, I've got you right where I want you,"

Before Stiles could press the emergency alarm or even ask wha he meant by that, the floor suddenly dropped out from beneath him, ripping a scream of terror out of his lungs as he fell into the darkness

He landed with a loud ***THUD*** on some sort of padding, a mattress or something- it was far too dark to see anything- but before he could even _begin _to try to get up, there was a slight crackling noise and then a horrendous, terrible pain in his back, like jolts of electricity pumping through his body__

__He screamed and screamed in pain, silently begging for it to stop, but the only thing that brought him any releif was when he finally passed out, unable to feel anything anymore_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

___"Derek? Are you there?"_ _ _

__"I'm here Cora," he confirmed, his hands tightening on the handlebars of his bike as the sound of the engine rumbled in his ears_ _

__He had been searching for Stiles for the past fifteen minutes, and although he usually wouldn't have resorted to the bike, he didn't want to bother with getting weighed down by other tournament participants trying to flag him down for a duel at the time_ _

__He was really hoping for some good information..._ _

___"You're not going to like this,"_ _ _

__Well there went that hope_ _

__"Let me guess, I'm going in the wrong direction?"_ _

___"Worse, we can't get a track on Stiles' duel disk,"_ _ _

__Wait.... what?_ _

__"But... how is that possible? Every duel disk has a built in tracker and it operates for the entire radius of the park!"_ _

___"They must have some kind of signal blocker or ... or they destroyed the tracker..."_ _ _

__If that were the case, then these theives were far smarter than he thought they were...._ _

__And that was a terrifying thought...._ _

__"So what do we do now? This just proves that Stiles is in trouble,"_ _

___"You'll have to look for him the old fashioned way,"_ _ _

__"That could take all night..."_ _

__Sure, he did have a little bit of an _advantage_ in comparison to most humans, but the park was so covered in different scents, different people, different _everything_ now, that he couldn't get ahold of any one scent no matter how hard he tried- much less track that one scent down potentially across the entire park..._ _

___"Not if you gather some reinforcements,"_ _ _

__"Reinforcements?"_ _

__He could almost _hear_ the smug smirk in Cora's tone after that_ _

___"Sending you coordinates to Lydia Martin's duel disk,"_ _ _

__Admittedly, Stiles' freinds were the last people he wanted to work with but..._ _

__He would do whatever he had to do- for Stiles...._ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__Stiles groaned lowly, wincing and forcing his body to move- fingers twitching, head turning, eyes scrunching... whatever he could do to try to jostle himself more awake than before_ _

__He couldn't remember what happened.... it was kind of in his head in blotchy little peices, his head was aching, his back was... his back was _killing_ him actually...._ _

__Very slowly, he forced his eyes open and blinked at the artificial light pouring in, hissing lowly and pushing himself to atleast half-way sit up, looking around desperately for anything that could tip him off to where he was or what happened_ _

__But all he could see right now was a big circle in front of him, resembling the bare bones of an arena_ _

__He tried moving closer to get a better look, but soon discovered that he couldn't move_ _

__Panic shot through him as he looked down, trying to move his leg, but his ankles were cuffed to the wall of the arena, leaving him nowhere to go and no way to escape..._ _

__"I see you're finally awake, took you long enough,"_ _

__That voice..._ _

__"Theo..." he groaned, rubbing his face sorely and glaring forward as the blonde made his way towards the opposite end of the arena, standing right across from Stiles now_ _

__Now it was all coming back to him... he never should have trusted Theo in the first place, he should have just kept walking or slammed down on the security button just on principal..._ _

__"So you remember, that's good, it'd have been awkward if you forgot,"_ _

__Stiles grumbled under his breath, glancing down at his gauntlet and counting each chip, feeling ... really confused when he realized that none of his chips were gone..._ _

__He carefully reached out and grabbed his deck from his disk, starting to flip through it to see if his cards were all in tact_ _

__"Relax, I didn't take anything from you, I _couldn't_ take anything from you,"_ _

__That made Stiles pause, confusion written all over his face as he stared up at the blonde across from him_ _

__"... Couldn't?"_ _

__"Oh believe me I tried, that was the intention really, nock you out, take your Dice card..."_ _

__Immediately, Stiles slid a hand in his pocket, panic rushing through him as he felt around for the card_ _

__"I already told you I couldn't take anything,"_ _

__For some twisted but miraculous reason, the guy was right, the card was still there, perfectly in tact..._ _

__Then...?_ _

__"Anyway, that necklace of your's prevented any foul play,"_ _

__"My... necklace?"_ _

__"I didn't see it when we first met, you have a protection necklace from the Hales, that means that no one can take anything of your's by force or against your will, you have to give everything over willingly,"_ _

__"Yeah, like that'll happen,"_ _

__He would sooner never pick up a dueling card again than willingly give Derek's Dice card to this freak...._ _

__"Mmm... you have no idea do you? So oblivious to the power around your neck... and the threat,"_ _

__Threat...?_ _

__Narrowing his eyes, he instinctively reached up towards his neck to feel the necklace.... and felt his blood go cold when that wasn't all that he felt_ _

__Around his neck was a thick, heavy collar, with some kind of plastic box attached to it..._ _

__It was completely covering his necklace, but that was probably the least of his worries, he was far more concerned with that plastic box on the collar than the necklace beneath it..._ _

__"What... what the hell!?"_ _

__"I'd be carefully touching that if I were you, because that, my freind, is a shock collar, but it isn't just ANY shock collar, see you and I are going to duel, as per tournament guidelines the winner gets the loser's rarest card- meaning your Beta Dice will be mine,"_ _

__"And what, if I refuse this thing'll shock me?"_ _

__"Not exactly..." Theo smirked, picking up a remote on the table next to him and pressing a button on top_ _

__The sound of static entered his feild of sound, prompting Stiles to glance towards it... and when he did, he felt his blood practically turn to ice_ _

__On the TV screen was an image of Malia tied to a chair and gagged... with a gun pointed at her head_ _

__"MALIA!!" Stiles screamed, instinctively standing up and nearly falling forward, the cuffs around his ankles creating an odd and frustrating sort of imbalance in his body now_ _

__"I thought that would get your attention, now if you don't duel, that gun is going to go off in your freind's pretty face, and if you continue to refuse, believe me, I know where the rest of your little gang is too, it won't be hard for me to send someone to get another one if you still refuse my offer,"_ _

__Stiles gritted his teeth, glaring at him with rage_ _

__"All of this for a duel? In case you didn't notice, we're in the middle of a freaking TOURNAMENT! I would've dueled you anyway!"_ _

__"Well, I have to admit, dueling was sort of a plan B, given that my original plan unexpectedly didn't work out,"_ _

__"You mean your original plan to _rob_ me?"_ _

__"We all have our talents," Theo smirked with a shrug_ _

__"Alright, so let me get this straight... I win this duel, I get your star chip and rarest card, and you set myself and Malia free.... is that right?"_ _

__"That's right," Theo promised, an absolutely wicked look on his face_ _

__No... it was too easy_ _

__This was too simple for someone who had _kidnapped him_...._ _

__"What's the catch?"_ _

__"Glad you asked, remember that shock collar? Well, everytime you lose life points, you'll feel the pain of that loss .. around your neck,"_ _

__Stiles started to tremble, fear coursing through his veins like a drug_ _

__"You... you're going to shock me for losing lifepoints?!"_ _

__"Oh... I'm not, but the game is," Theo smirked back_ _

__"Explain..." Stiles snarled, his heart hammering in his chest as he glared at the man across from him_ _

__"You're already hooked up Stiles, take a look at your duel disk, a GOOD look,"_ _

__Doing as Theo said, Stiles stared down at his duel disk, his face draining of color at the sight of a thin, clear cable connecting his life point counter up his arm and ultimately, he assumed, to the shock collar_ _

__"The first few times will just be a little twinge, but the more you lose, the worse the pain will become,"_ _

__"You'll never get away with this," Stiles hissed_ _

__"And why not? Once you lose this duel, you'll hand over your dice card and I'll be home free, your cuffs will only unlock themselves if my life points hit zero so you'll be trapped down here when you lose, and if you think anyone will find you down here? Think again, I disabled the tracker in your duel disk, as well as the emergency alarm, no one will find you Stiles, not now, not ever,"_ _

__Stiles gritted his teeth, his hands twitching in a mixture of fury and fear_ _

__For the first time in ages, he was really, truly, terrified of losing, and his confidence in himself had been shaken down to absolutely nothing... until he took a better look at Theo's side of the arena..._ _

__"You said I have to give you this card willingly?" Stiles asked slowly_ _

__"Then we're playing this game by _my_ rules,"_ _

__"Sorry, no dice- so to speak- I'm not taking the collar off,"_ _

__"No, I didn't expect you to, what I expect... is for you to put a collar _on_ ,"_ _

__That actually seemed to unnerve Theo for a moment, wich gave Stiles the edge he needed to start feeling a little more confident in himself_ _

__"I see your side of the feild Theo, put the cuffs around your ankles and put a collar around your neck, if you don't, I'm not dueling,"_ _

__"Your freind-"_ _

__"Those are my conditions," Stiles snapped_ _

__"You shouldn't be worried, didn't you say I'm going to lose this battle? What will it matter to you to humor me? Do this, and I'll _happily_ hand over the card once I lose,"_ _

__Theo gritted his teeth, his nose wrinkling in frustration before stepping away from the arena for a moment_ _

__"I'll be back soon, don't try anything stupid or your freind dies,"_ _

__Stiles nodded, watching in silence as Theo went out a door near his side of the arena and left him alone, atleast for a few moments_ _

__He hurried to grab his Dice card out of his pocket and slide it into his deck, his heart pounding a mile a minute as he did_ _

__The tracker and alarm were disabled, but those weren't the only ways to get Derek's attention... he just hoped his emergency back up plan wouldn't cost Malia her life..._ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__"Lydia!! Wait!"_ _

__"If this is about a duel Derek, I've already got my thirteenth chip, I'm not dueling you or anyone else until the finals,"_ _

__"It's about Stiles,"_ _

__That finally seemed to give her pause, eyebrows pinching as she turned on her heel to face the man on the motorcycle_ _

__"Explai-"_ _

__"Stiles is in danger- serious.... _serious_ danger,"_ _

__Lydia's face drained of color, the gravity of the situation clearly sinking in as she took another step towards the other dueler_ _

__"It's that pack ... that pack that stole Allison's cards, isn't it?"_ _

__Derek was visibly shaken by that, but quickly composed himself, jaw tensing and head shaking_ _

__"I don't know what you're-"_ _

__"Save it Derek, Allison told me _everything_ , she's _been_ telling me everything for months now, about your families, about what the games, about your ... furry little inconvenience and everything that comes with it,"_ _

__"Did she tell you that she kills innocent people for no reason other than what's in their DNA?" Derek hissed_ _

__"Allison isn't a hunter, she wouldn't take part in that-"_ _

__"No, she'd only take part in the money coming from a game that her family stole from mine, right?" he bit_ _

__"Can we not do this right now? Isn't Stiles in trouble?"_ _

__As much as Derek absolutely hated to admit it, she had a point, and he couldn't waste precious time arguing with Lydia about her girlfreind's moral standing in the world, or about old family politics_ _

__"What can I do to help?" Lydia asked, clearly noticing that Derek had given up the argument, for now_ _

__"I need you to help me track him down, his duel disk's tracker has been severed but he's in a duel somewhere, he just came online as having placed a card on the feild,"_ _

__"Alright, we should find everyone else too, get them to help out,"_ _

__"Way ahead of you, Cora has tracked down the other four in your group, I have packmates hunting them down right now, were they... ok the last time you saw them?"_ _

__Lydia nodded slowly, but paused, a grim look crossing her face_ _

__"Malia.... I haven't seen her all day, not since we split up this morning, no one has actually... until now I've just thought she was avoiding everyone so she could duel like I've been doing but-"_ _

__"But now you're worried that something has happened to her too?"_ _

__"She may have won a Dice card like Stiles," Lydia agreed with a nod_ _

__"No... no Stiles doesn't have any Dice cards anymore, he gave them both to me, and he never played them so no one would be able to track them down by hacking into his duel disk, why wou-"_ _

__"You said he gave you _both_ cards?" Lydia frowned_ _

__"Wich ones did he give you?"_ _

__"Ah... Dice Hearts and Summoning Dice, why?"_ _

__"Because he has one more..." Lydia breathed, her expression going from hesitantly anxious, to full blown panic_ _

__"What? Why would he give me two and not the other? Wich one does he ha-"_ _

__"Because Allison gave him one, he didn't know it, she slipped it into his pocket earlier along with..."_ _

__"Along with....?"_ _

__"Along with the necklace from the Dice tournament, she convinced Scott to give it back to her a few nights ago, now Stiles has it,"_ _

__If Derek hadn't been on his bike- and making a conscious effort not to get off of it- he would have charged at Lydia, anger flaring up in his body like a raging flame, teeth gritting and eyes burning bright gold_ _

__" _ **My**_ necklace!?"_ _

__"Derek this isn't the time-!"_ _

__"First the Argents steal it and then they pass it around like a White Elephant gift!"_ _

__"Think of Stiles!!! Derek you need to listen to me and think about Stiles!"_ _

__For the second time that evening, Derek was forced to swallow his anger- his rage, his fury, his blinding outrage and acrimony- and concentrate on the task at hand_ _

__"Wich card?"_ _

__"The Beta card,"_ _

__"Why did she give it to him? And why not tell him about it?"_ _

__"Because it would seem weird for her to just give him a card out of the blue, not to mention the necklace, she wanted to make sure that atleast _one_ card was kept away from that pack and she knew that she wouldn't be a good enough duelist to manage if she were to get into a battle, if the worst happened... she wanted to make sure that she would be able to keep atleast one of the three major cards safe,"_ _

__"And she doesn't trust Scott to do that?" Derek asked curiously_ _

__"She doesn't trust Scott not to _play_ them, she knew Stiles was too cautious of a dueler to play a card he didn't know backwards and forwards so she knew that even if he _did_ lose- wich was highly unlikely- he wouldn't have put it on the feild, meaning-"_ _

__"He wouldn't have had to forfeit it, and because of the necklace it wouldn't be stolen from him either,"_ _

__"She knew that the pack would be after her's all day, not to mention your's, and she figured that Scott would be a big target too, but she knew that the necklace being in Scott's possession was public knowledge, if they knew Scott had the card they'd know he had the necklace too, she figured she'd trick them into believing Scott would have the necklace on him so they wouldn't bother trying to steal anything from him to begin with,"_ _

__"And is that why she gave you one of the other cards?"_ _

__"Yes, she trusts that I won't lose, and she gave me a little extra insurance," she added, reaching into her pocket and withdrawing a bronze necklace, similar to the one Stiles had- a clear imitation, a _mockery_ that the Argents must have made copying the magic of the silver necklace Stiles had now, though he hoped that was _all_ it was copying...._ _

__A growl tore out of Derek's throat, but he knew that he couldn't go there now, he couldn't waste his time on anger when he had to worry about getting Stiles out of danger- and Malia too, potentially_ _

__"I don't understand, why not leave the cards at home then? If she was so worried about losing them..."_ _

__"Because she's a Dice player, she knew her best odds at winning these duels and getting the other Dice cards back would be to use the Dice cards she already had, and she knew that for some of us, it may be the _only_ way to win the cards back, but she hadn't realized how hard this competition would be, she over-estimated herself and realized that she couldn't depend on herself to keep the cards safe, that's why she divided them between the three duelists she felt were the strongest out of our group, Scott, myself, and Stiles,"_ _

__"And she knew that of the three of you, the only one who would never play a card he didn't know anything about was Stiles, so she gave him one without telling him to _ensure_ he would never play it,"_ _

__"It was her only choice, I know about how all of the cards work already and Scott is reckless enough that he would play it regardless if he was in a pinch, even Kira and Malia would, but Stiles-"_ _

__"I get it," Derek snapped, squeezing the handlebars of his bike and having to seriously keep himself from squeezing too hard and cracking the bars_ _

__"I need to get back to looking for Stiles,"_ _

__"I know, do you have any places underground? That might be the best place to start looking,"_ _

__"A few.... I'll keep it in mind, thanks," he growled, grabbing his helmet and securing it over his head before starting the engine again_ _

__"Wait, do you have Malia's coordinants?" Lydia asked suddenly, causing a look of confusion to breifly flash across his face_ _

__"Yeah, why?"_ _

__"Because I have the odd feeling that if we find Malia, we'll find Stiles,"_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__"Why are you doing this? What makes these cards worth human lives!?"_ _

__"Oh Stiles... to me? Human lives aren't even worth the price of a cheap, one-star card," Theo cackled_ _

__"How very Hannibal Lecter of you, can I assume that you're the one who stole the Dice cards from the Argents in the first place?" Stiles frowned_ _

__"You're correct, but I can't take _all_ the credit, I have an entire pack of people who helped me,"_ _

__"A _pack_? What are they, sodas?"_ _

__"Very funny, but you'd better hurry up with your turn Stiles, if you don't play a card soon your turn will time out,"_ _

__Unfortunately, Theo was right_ _

__Swallowing tightly, Stiles glanced down at his hand and plucked two cards, setting one face down, and one face up on the feild_ _

__"I play Green Phantom King in defense mode and place one card face down, that'll end my turn,"_ _

__"That's quite a weak start Stiles, and you know what they say: Weak start, weak finish,"_ _

__"Just make your move Theo," Stiles snapped, clutching his cards a little closer to his chest_ _

__"As you wish... I'll summon Jirai Gumo, then play three cards face down, ending my turn," Theo announced_ _

__Stiles gave a slow nod, glancing down at his hand and wrinkling his nose_ _

__He didn't have any monster cards that could defeat that spider, and right now, his phantom had the strongest defense points of the monsters in his hand..._ _

__"I'll place another card face down, now... move,"_ _

__Theo cackled, looking absolutely _thrilled_ with that_ _

__"As you wish... as per Jurai Gumo's special ability, I have to flip a coin before I can attack, if I call it right, your Phantom will be destroyed, call it wrong, and I lose half my life points,"_ _

__Half his life points? Why would Theo take such an enormous risk? Unless he knew that he would win..._ _

__A spinning, holographic coin appeared on the feild, and Stiles could already feel his stomach sinking as Theo called his guess_ _

__"I'm going to take... heads,"_ _

__Surely enough, when the coin flipped, it landed on heads, meaning-_ _

__"Now Jurai Gumo, attack his Phantom!"_ _

__Stiles cursed under his breath, teeth gritted as he watched the hologram of his monster shatter to peices, but atleast he wouldn't lose life points..._ _

__"Your move," Theo practically purred_ _

__Stiles inhaled deeply, drawing a card from his deck and grinning_ _

__"Alright... I summon Maha Vailo in attack mode, and then I play Rush Recklessly, wich will increase Maha Vailo's attack points from 1,550 to 2,250, just enough to defeat your Jirai Gumo, so... Maha Vailo, attack his spider now!"_ _

__"Cute trick, but it won't work, I activate my trap card- Shift, wich will allow me to transfer your attack from my Jirai Gumo, to my face-down monster- Creeping Doom Manta,"_ _

__Stiles cursed louder, watching as his spellcaster destroy Theo's face-down card, the spider going entirely untouched_ _

__"Now... I'll set another card face down, then summon The Illusory Gentleman, and since my Gentleman's attack points are lower than your Maha Vailo's, I'll play Malevolent Nuzzler, wich will increase my monster's attack points by seven hundred- more than enough to take out your spellcaster,"_ _

__Take out his spellcaster... _and_ hit his lifepoints_ _

__"Get ready to feel the pain,"_ _

__"No!"_ _

__"Now my Gentleman, attack his Maha Vailo and give him the shock of his life!"_ _

__He didn't have any cards on the feild that could stop the attack, all he had were his Giant Soldier Of Stone in defense mode, and Remove Trap..._ _

__A shreik sounded out as his monster was destroyed, and the moment his life points started to tick down, he felt a shock course through the shock collar around his neck, electricity flooding through his body, but it wasn't as bad as he was thinking, more like a _really_ bad static shock_ _

__It wasn't good, but it wasn't as bad as he had feared_ _

__"Don't forget, each time you lose points the shock will increase, that was only a tickle compared to what will happen by the time your points hit zero,"_ _

__"Thanks for the reminder," Stiles snapped in irritation as he drew a card from the top of his deck_ _

__He needed something good, if he didn't get something that could help _now_ this duel would be over before it really even began_ _

__And it looked like luck was on his side..._ _

__"I place one card face down, and summon Pitch Black Warwolf, thanks to my wolf's special ability, as long as he's on the feild, you can't use any traps,"_ _

__Theo cursed, wich tipped off Stiles to exactly what he needed to know- atleast one of his face down cards was a trap_ _

___Good_ _ _

__"Now my wolf, attack his Illusionary Gentleman!"_ _

__Theo gritted his teeth as his monster was destroyed, but he barely flinched when the electricity shot through his body_ _

__"You'll pay for that Stilinski, mark my words... I play another card face down, then I activate my Castle Of Dark Illusions!"_ _

__Suddenly the sky began to crackle on the feild, the atmosphere it's self seemed to rupture as an enormous cloud of darkness slowly engulfed the feild... and prevented Stiles from seeing any of the holograms on Theo's side of the feild, or even his opponent..._ _

__"What the ... what the hell is happening? I.. I can't see!"_ _

__"That's because my Castle Of Dark Illusions covers the entire feild in shadows, my side of the feild is completely shrouded in darkness, preventing you from seeing any of my moves, and because there's nothing in the rule book about _announcing_ my attacks, you'll never see what I have coming, in addition to that, my Castle has a defensive power of 2,500, meaning that you won't be able to get any attacks in on me, even if you COULD see my monsters,"_ _

__Stiles' heart was pounding, his very being beginning to shake, how could he win against something he couldn't see...?_ _

__"Now I'll just flip another coin, and I call on heads, so that my Jurai Gumo can eat your wolf for breakfast,"_ _

__He couldn't see what the coin landed on, the coin was on Theo's side of the feild, so he didn't know if Theo was winning or losing... but considering he didn't hear Theo's life points tick down, he had a pretty good feeling he knew what was happening..._ _

__"Not so fast Theo, I activate my face down card- Magical Hats!"_ _

__Upon rising, the card produced four magician's hats, covering up his wolf and his giant_ _

__"What!?"_ _

__"Not so fun being unable to see your opponent's moves, now is it Theo? Come on, attack me if you dare! But you only have a one in three chance of attacking my wolf, if you want to destroy him, you'll have to find him first,"_ _

__Theo growled- a deep, audible growl, that didn't even sound human..._ _

__"Fine then, Jurai Gumo, attack the hat on the far right!"_ _

__Stiles smirked, a quick flash of releif lighting through him as the spider ensnared and destroyed an empty hat_ _

__"Smirk all you want now Stilinski, but you can't keep that hat trick up forever, sooner or later your wolf will be mine, and all that will be left for you will be darkness,"_ _

__As much as Stiles hated to admit it, Theo was right_ _

__Even if his odds were at their best, he only had two turns left in his hat trick, and if he didn't figure out how to protect his wolf and destroy Theo's Castle Of Dark Illusions within that time, losing Derek's card would be the least of his worries..._ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__Just as she thought_ _

__As soon as Lydia was close enough to be within sight of Malia's duel disk, she could see the state of the matter_ _

__Malia was tied to one of the spinning chairs in Monster Land's Spinning Magical Hats ride- some corny take off on the spinning teacups at Disneyland she presumed- and in front of her was some goon with a gun, she assumed he belonged to the pack of theives that had stolen the Dice cards in the first place_ _

__She knew she couldn't approach without tipping him off and putting Malia's life in serious danger, but there _was_ another option..._ _

__Her eyes traveled towards the control booth a few yards away, a smirk lighting up her features as she began sneaking towards it_ _

__She may not be able to fight Theo's goon face on- not yet anyway- but that didn't mean she couldn't get Malia out of harm's way...._ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__"I suggest you make your move Stilinski, why prolong the inevitable?"_ _

__"Tch..." Stiles snorted, his heart pounding so loudly that he was sure Theo could hear it as he set his fingers over his deck and drew a card_ _

___'Please....'_ he thought_ _

___'Let this be something that will help me, let this be something that can help me win so I can protect the people I care about and keep my promise to Derek...'_ _ _

__He was practically holding his breath as he looked down at the card he drew, releif sparking in him- even if it was only slightly_ _

__"I may not be able to see the cards you have on the feild right now Theo... but I'm about to see one that you have in your hand, thanks to The Inexperienced Spy, I can now see one card that you have in your hand, and I choose the one that's dead center,"_ _

__Theo snorted, but Stiles couldn't see his facial expression_ _

__"As you wish," Theo sneered, sliding his card into one of the slots on his duel disk to show it to his opponent_ _

___Jingen Bakudan_ _ _

__"Jingen.. Bakudan...." Stiles read slowly_ _

__That card had the potential to _completely_ screw him over_ _

__With that, Theo could combine half of the attack power of all the monsters he had on the feild and use it to directly attack Stiles' life points_ _

__Right now he only had Jurai Gumo, but who knew what other cards he had in his hand? Or how many of his face down cards were monsters...?_ _

__Stiles needed to get rid of that thing- _fast_ \- and he knew just the way_ _

__"Alright, now I'll activate one of the cards I laid face down on the feild- Card Destruction! Thanks to my magic card all of the cards in your hand are now going to the graveyard,"_ _

__It was well worth it, his hand was nothing to care about anyway, he needed new cards and he _definitely_ needed to rid Theo of that Jingen Bakudon_ _

__Unfortunately, his joy didn't last very long_ _

__The moment he heard the slight _click_ of Theo's cards being sent to the graveyard, he heard the sound of cackling coming from across the feild_ _

__"I was hoping you'd do that, you know how when someone loses one of their five senses, the other four become more sensitive to compensate? Well when a duelist can't control what's happening on the _feild_ , they try to take control of what happens in their opponent's _hand_ ,"_ _

__"So you knew I was going to play Card Destruction-"_ _

__"Sooner or later yes, wich is why I set a trap that would work best with that card- Blessings Of The Nile!"_ _

__"NO!" Stiles screamed_ _

__"YES! Thanks to Blessings Of The Nile, I can replenish my life points by one thousand for every card _you_ forced me to discard from my hand, wich was four- that means that my life points increase by four thousand!!"_ _

__Increased by four thousand.... but Theo _already_ had over three thousand life points as it was, meaning that now he had over _seven_ thousand_ _

__If Stiles thought it would be hard to beat him with four thousand life points at the beginning of the game, _seven_ thousand seemed almost impossible..._ _

__"Now it's MY move!" Theo laughed_ _

__"First I play Pot Of Greed, wich will allow me to draw two more cards from my deck, then I'll use my Fissure card to destroy your Giant Soldier Of Stone- the magical hats won't protect it from Fissure!"_ _

__Stiles cursed louder, watching in a panic as his soldier vanished into a gaping hole in the feild beneath it_ _

__"Now you only have two hats left and I have a 50/50 chance of getting your wolf.... so, I'll play another monster card, and then flip a coin to allow my Jirai Gumo to attack!"_ _

__Another monster card?_ _

__Why did Theo bother to announce that and not say what it was?_ _

__Stiles braced himself, his legs starting to shake as he watched the giant spider come out of the shadows towards his hats_ _

__"Attack the one on the left!"_ _

__An empty hat was destroyed, much to Theo's displeasure, but that meant that his hat trick was officially over, the remaining hat disappeared... and his wolf was exposed..._ _

__"No matter, next turn my Jirai Gumo will become a wolf-eating spider, and you'll feel the pain of that loss more than you can even imagine,"_ _

__Stiles gritted his teeth, drawing a card and staring down at his hand_ _

__He could do this, if he played his hand in _just_ the right way, he could do this...._ _

__But it would come at a cost_ _

__"First I lay one card face down, then I play Darkfire Soldier in attack mode, but before I decide on an attack... I play the magic card Sparks! That will not only reduce your life points by two hundred, it'll also temporarily light up your side of the feild and show me your hidden monster!"_ _

__Little flames appeared on the feild, Theo's life points dropping as they breifly lit up the shadows around Theo's side of the feild, and showed him exactly what he needed to see_ _

__The second monster Theo had was Koumori Dragon, wich would be easy to defeat thanks to his Darkfire Soldier_ _

__And because Theo had been so cocky, he had played his dragon in attack mode, meaning that he would lose life points for that too_ _

__"Now Darkfire Soldier! Attack his dragon!"_ _

__The dragon let out a yowl as it was destroyed, and Theo barely restrained a scream of pain from the electric shock traveling through his system_ _

__"You're definitely in for it now Stilinski... I'm summoning another monster and then I'm going to use my Jirai Gumo to destroy your wolf! I just have to toss the coin, and I _never_ lose a coin toss, I choose tails!"_ _

__Stiles wasn't sure how, but he knew Theo was telling the truth about never losing the coin toss_ _

__Maybe he was just lucky or maybe he was cheating, but Stiles knew there was only one way to keep that spider away from his wolf now_ _

__"Not so fast! I'm revealing my trap card- Fairy Box!"_ _

__"Fairy Box?" Theo asked with frustration_ _

__"Yeah, I have to pay five hundred life points, but thanks to Fairy Box, now _I'm_ the one who gets to toss a coin and if I call it right, your spider's attack points will be reduced to zero for one turn,"_ _

__The life points ticked down on Stiles' counter, causing a pulse of electricity- much stronger than the first- to flood through his body, tearing a scream of pain from his throat_ _

__"I.. I call tails!" Stiles gasped as the holographic coin appeared on the feild_ _

__His body was shaking and his eyes were tearing up, watching anxiously as the coin flipped.. and flipped... and flipped... and then finally-_ _

__"Tails!!" Stiles beamed with releif, watching as the spider's attack points dropped down to zero_ _

__"Now my Pitch Black Warwolf, devour his spider alive!"_ _

__"No!" Theo screamed_ _

__But it was no use, his wolf bit into the spider's head, effectively sending him to the graveyard_ _

__"You may have destroyed my spider, but you also destroyed the only card on my feild that you know anything about, meaning that as of now, _all_ of my cards are a complete mystery to you,"_ _

__Unfortunately... Theo was right_ _

__The spider was gone but for all Stiles knew, Theo had something even worse waiting in the wings, and unless he found a way to destroy that castle or illuminate the feild in his next turn, he may be as good as dead..._ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__It was a good thing that Lydia had taken some online engineering courses, all she had needed to do was take her pocket manicure set out of her purse, a little tinkering... and she was able to turn on the ride_ _

___'See how well you aim when you're spinning so hard you can't even sit up...'_ she thought with a smirk_ _

__Now all she had to do was sneak into the booth and turn it on..._ _

__"Did you _really_ think you were going to get away with this?"_ _

__Rats..._ _

__Lydia gritted her teeth, eyes narrowed as she slowly turned around to face the man behind her_ _

__He didn't have a gun, but his features weren't human and that seemed to more than make up for it_ _

__His fingernails were pointed claws, teeth were sharp fangs, and his eyes were blazing blue_ _

__"I suggest you make your way to one of the hats now, before things have to get ugly,"_ _

__Lydia inhaled deeply, through her nose, but did as he said, as of now, just because she didn't have any way to argue with him, ofcourse, that didn't mean she didn't have a way out...._ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__"It's your move, but whatever you do, I doubt it'll help," Theo snickered_ _

__"Yeah? Well I think it's about time some of your bets stop paying off," Stiles huffed, drawing a card from the top of his deck_ _

__And thankfully, it was a card he could really put to use..._ _

__"Now I play Light Of Intervention!"_ _

__"Light Of Intervention!?"_ _

__"Yes! Thanks to this card, all of your monsters must be played in face-up position, and thanks to the card being a light card, it'll illuminate all of the monsters on your side of the feild, thus rendering your castle virtually ineffective!"_ _

__Theo hissed in anger, watching as a beam of light rained down on his monster cards, revealing them to be Swordsman Of Landstar and Mammoth Graveyard_ _

__Low level monsters, easy prey for his wolf _and_ his soldier, but he wasn't done yet_ _

__"I summon Dancing Fairy in defense mode, and thanks to my card's special ability, I'll gain a thousand life points for every turn I have it on the feild, I finally set one card face down and end my turn,"_ _

__"Took you long enough," Theo grumbled, drawing a card and smirking_ _

__"I play Ookazi, wich will direct eight hunded points of damage to your life points,"_ _

__Stiles let out a loud shreik as electricity flooded through his body, shaking him down to his bones as his legs trembled, threatening to give out_ _

__But he kept standing, as hard as it was, as painfull as it was, kept standing, panting and tightening his fists, nearly bending his cards as he glared at his opponent_ _

__"I hope you're getting used to the aftershocks, because I'm not done, now my Mammoth Graveyard, attack his Dancing Fairy and get that little nuisance off the feild!"_ _

__"I don't think so! Reveal! My Pyarmid Energy! Thanks to my pyramid, I can increase the defense points of all monsters on my side of the feild by five hundred until the end of my turn, meaning that your mammoth's attack is useless!"_ _

__Theo cursed as his life points ticked down by three hundred, but it wasn't enough to make that big of an impact_ _

__"Well I say useless but that was a fun little spark," Stiles grinned_ _

__"Just shut up and make your move!"_ _

__"Huh, and here I thought you were enjoying this duel," Stiles teased_ _

__"No matter, first I'm going to sacrifice my Darkfire Soldier and summon Flower Wolf in his place, I then set one card face down, and finally command my Flower Wolf to destroy your Mammoth Graveyard!"_ _

__Theo hissed, screaming out as an electric shock flooded through his body, life points ticking down further_ _

__"I was waiting for that... now I activate my Last Will card, now that you've sent my mammoth to the graveyard, thanks to Last Will, I can summon any monster I want from my deck with 1,500 attack points or less, and I choose Witty Phantom!"_ _

__"That won't be enough to destroy either of my wolves,"_ _

__"No but it'll take out that pesky fairy! But first, I'm playing my Remove Trap card, and taking out that Light Of Intervention!"_ _

__"No! My light!"_ _

__"Now you're in the dark again, I bet you're regretting getting rid of your only fire monster right about now huh? Now Witty Phantom, attack his fairy!"_ _

__"Not so fast, I'm activating my Horn Of Heaven, wich will allow my fairy to have an extra eight hundred defense points, thus warding off your Phantom _and_ bringing your life points down by another four hundred!"_ _

__Theo screamed again, but this time, it did nothing to satisfy Stiles_ _

__He was in the dark again and he had foolishly sacrificed his only source of light..._ _

__"I hope you enjoyed having the light Stiles, because the rest of my monsters will be once again hidden in the dark,"_ _

__Stiles cursed under his breath, his heart pounding again as he stared at the pitch black feild_ _

__But his day was only about to get worse..._ _

__Just before he could draw a card, the TV Theo had on the other side of the room that had shown Malia to him earlier flickered on again, granting him some light... but not the kind he wanted...._ _

__"Hm? Josh, what's with your interrupting?" Theo frowned_ _

___"I just thought I should let you know that the stakes for your opponent have risen,"_ _ _

___What...?_ _ _

__"Oh really? And how is that?" Theo purred_ _

__The man on the screen, Josh, started to cackle, turning the camera around... and revealing Lydia tied up to one of the spinning hats..._ _

__"LYDIA!!"_ _

___"I caught her trying to mess with the controls on the ride, she must have had some plan to release her freind,"_ _ _

__"And how fortune that you caught her hm?" Theo grinned_ _

__Stiles was feeling anxious before.... but he was downright panicked now_ _

__Once against Theo had him at a disadvantage, and now he had not one, but two of his freinds_ _

__Meaning if Stiles lost, even more people would die..._ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__Lydia could barely tolerate listening to this idiot croon on and on about his accomplishment in capturing her, but she knew it would only be a matter of time_ _

__One of the Hale Corp employees would be there soon to help them, but until then... she had been bringing her nail clippers down over and over again on the masking tape around her wrists since the moment she had gotten caught, having managed to hide it in her belt before she was tied up_ _

__Now she was finally on the last thread, and once it was snipped..._ _

__She rushed to grab her duel disk, activating it and drawing the first card in her deck_ _

__"Hey-!"_ _

__"Guardian Elma, I summon you! Attack the goon with the gun- NOW!"_ _

__"What!? You can't attack a real person with a hologram!"_ _

__"Then _clearly_ you've never played with a duel disk!" Lydia grinned_ _

__Surely enough, the hologram of her monster rushed forward, stabbing at the man, and even though none of her attacks landed, it was enough of a nuisance to confuse him_ _

__"Hey!!" the other goon shouted, turning away from the camera as Lydia jumped up from the ride, racing towards the control booth, but not before giving a way to stall the other goon as well_ _

__"Celtic Guardian! Attack the werewolf NOW!" she shouted, slamming her card down on her duel disk_ _

__The hologram rushed at the wolf, giving Lydia the time she needed to get to the booth and turn it on full blast_ _

__Both of the goons screamed as the ride spun and spun, and Lydia smirked as she turned towards the woods_ _

__"Are you there?"_ _

__Thankfully, a beautifull blonde wolf stalked out of the woods towards her, keeping her head low as she approached_ _

__"I'm not sure who you are, but you're with Derek, that's all I need to know,"_ _

__She gave it another moment before abruptly stopping the ride, easily nocking both of the goons to the ground as they stumbled and struggled to regain their balance_ _

__The wolf wasted no time in charging at the ride, jumping onto it and easily biting the hand that held the gun_ _

__Lydia, in the mean time, made her way to the camera, bending down and peering into it_ _

__"Stiles! I don't know where you are or what state you're in, but if you can hear me, win your duel! And for God's sake find a way to let Derek know where you are! We've got things covered here, you don't need to worry about us anymore, just concentrate on saving yourself,"_ _

__The howl of a wolf drew her attention back to the ride, and she hurried away from the camera, intent on helping her mysterious blonde freind take down her kidnappers and rescue Malia_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__Malia and Lydia were safe..._ _

__That brought Stiles immense releif, so much so that for a moment, he forgot about the state of this duel_ _

__"No matter, we had an agreement, if I win I get your Dice card, and you die here all alone, your feinds may be safe but you _definitely_ aren't,"_ _

__No, he wasn't, but that was ok_ _

__If his freinds were safe then he didn't care nearly as much about himself_ _

__"I'm not out yet," he muttered, drawing a card from his deck_ _

__"I play Feral Imp in defense mode, then put one card face down and end my turn,"_ _

__Without knowing what Theo had up his sleeve, it was dangerous to do anything else at the moment_ _

__And judging by Theo's cackling, he was beginning to feel that that was the right move..._ _

__"You're going to pay for taking out my monsters Stiles... now beware, as I send your fairy to the graveyard!"_ _

__Suddenly a ghostly, demonic looking thing sprang out from the darkness and gripped his fairy in it's hand, crushing it to smitherines_ _

__Because it was in defense mode, Stiles wasn't out any life points.... but now he wouldn't get the thousand point bonus anymore either..._ _

__"What in the hell was that!?"_ _

__"I sacrificed my Swordsman Of Landstar and my Witty Phantom to summon a bigger, better monster, I also place one card on the feild and end my turn,"_ _

__Stiles was starting to sweat, he needed a miracle to pull this off.... and according to the card he just drew, he would get that miracle_ _

__But it would take the _exact_ perfect combination to pull off_ _

__If he could do it though, he could do some serious damage, but he couldn't risk there being a single flaw or it would all be over..._ _

__"First I'll set two cards face down, and then I'll play my Himotama magic card, wich will inflict five hundred points of damage directly to your life points!"_ _

__Theo screamed as his life points ticked down, electricity pumping through him as fireballs rained down on the feild... and illuminated Theo's side..._ _

__It revealed three face-down cards, Kaiser Seahorse, and Despair From The Dark, hopefully though, nothing that could stop his plan..._ _

__"Now I'll play Trade In, at the sacrifice of a level eight monster I can draw two more cards,"_ _

__He sent his monster to the graveyard, drew two cards.... and bit his lip_ _

__This hand could either be everything or nothing, depending on how things went_ _

__He drew his Red Eyes Black Dragon... and Derek's Beta Dice card_ _

__The Beta Dice...._ _

__"Are you done yet?" Theo snapped_ _

__The Beta Dice...._ _

___Exactly_ what he needed_ _

__Derek would be notified whenever a Dice card was played on the feild, it was a longshot, but if he put it on the feild, maybe, just maybe, Derek would be able to find him and help him out of this if things turned bad_ _

__"I play one more card face down, and then I activate one of my previous face-down cards- Monster Reborn, wich will bring my eight-star monster back from the graveyard and onto the feild without me having to make a sacrifice, so welcome... Black Luster Soldier!"_ _

__"Black Luster Soldier..? But you can't summon him without a ritual!"_ _

__"Not so with Monster Reborn," Stiles grinned_ _

__"Now my soldier, attack his Despair From The Dark!"_ _

__He could destroy the Castle Of Dark Illusions with his soldier, but he needed to get that monster out of the way before it went for one of his weaker monsters...._ _

__"I don't think so!" Theo sneered_ _

__"I activate my face down card, Gravity Axe Grarl! Thanks to this axe my Despair From The Dark will be granted an extra five hundred attack points, and as long as it's on the feild, you can't change the position of any of your monsters,"_ _

__Stiles cursed, his fingers twitching in irritation_ _

__Thanks to that axe, his Black Luster Soldier might be rendered useless before he even made an attack..._ _

__Theo chuckled devilishly, drawing another card from his deck, eyes practically sparkling_ _

__"First I'll play A Cat Of Ill Omen, wich will allow me to draw any trap card I want from my deck and place it at the top,"_ _

__A trap card?_ _

__Why would-..._ _

___Oh no..._ _ _

__"Judging by the look on your face I think you know what's coming next, first my Kaiser Seahorse will destroy your Feral Imp, and then... my Despair From The Dark will take out your Pitch Black Warwolf! I'm tired of my trap cards going to waste so I'll spare your soldier for now, but rest assured, _he's next_ ,"_ _

__Stiles hurried to activate one of his face down cards, heart racing with panic_ _

__"Go! Waboku! Thanks to this card my life points are safe from your attack,"_ _

__Although watching his Warwolf be blasted to peices was _definitely_ not fun..._ _

__Theo cackled, presmably grinning from ear to ear, not that Stiles could see with that freaking castle in the way though..._ _

__"Your move,"_ _

___'Come on... I need something good, if I don't draw exactly the right card at this very moment, my Black Luster Soldier will be destroyed, and after that... I don't even want to think about what might happen next...'_ _ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

___"Derek? Are you there?"_ _ _

__"I'm always here Cora," Derek said quietly, nose wrinkled as he stared in frustration at the empty basement_ _

__He had taken Lydia's advice by searching for Stiles in the underground rooms first, but it was an amusement park, there were underground rooms and tunnels everywhere and he had barely even scratched the surface, yet still had no extra luck in finding Stiles_ _

__He was starting to get worried- very, very worried_ _

___"We just got a hit on one of the Dice cards and you'll never believe wich one it is,"_ _ _

__"Please tell me it's the Beta Dice..."_ _

___"Yeah, how'd you know?"_ _ _

__"Blind optimism, where is it transmitting from?" he asked hurriedly, rushing out of the basement beneath the snack stand and up the stairs, towards his motorcycle_ _

___"Well that's the curious part, the duel disk it's been played on has had it's tracker disabled, but luckily for us, I can still track the signal the card it's self is transmitting on a map, and it looks like it's coming from underneath the haunted house,"_ _ _

__" _Stiles..._ " Derek breathed, hurrying to grab his helmet_ _

__"Thanks Cora, haunted house, here I come..."_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__Releif flooded through Stiles, his shoulders sagging and a grin spreading across his face_ _

__He had just drawn the one card he needed most in that moment, and now he had a plan_ _

__"First I play two cards face down, then I summon Fox Fire in defense mode, and finally... I play Mystical Space Typhoon, wich will destroy one magic or trap card on the feild! And I choose your Gravity Axe!"_ _

__"NO!"_ _

__"Yes! Now that that menace is gone.... Black Luster Soldier, attack and destroy his Despair From The Dark!"_ _

__Theo screamed in agony as his life points spiraled down, the shock collar around his neck no doubt sending him a terrible jolt as he panted and heaved, spitting at the ground_ _

__"I'm not done, first I'll activate my Poison Fangs magic card, and then my Flower Wolf will destroy your Kaiser Seahorse! And thanks to my magic card, it'll take you down an extra five hundred life points each time my wolf attacks,"_ _

__He screamed again, legs buckling and nearly dropping to the ground as Stiles watched his monster burst into shards and dissappear, life points ticking down even further_ _

__"You... you're going to pay for that!" Theo screamed, slowly rising back to a full stand as he drew a card from his deck_ _

__"First I'll play two cards face down and summon Magician Of Faith in defense mode, and thanks to her special ability I'm also able to bring back one magic card from my graveyard, wich I'll play face down,"_ _

__Crap...._ _

__Theo had used so many magic cards, it was impossible to tell wich one he would revive..._ _

__"Then I'll play Just Desserts, wich will inflict five hundred points of damage to your life points for every monster you have on the feild, and right now? I count three, so say goodbye to fifteen hundred lifepoints!"_ _

__The pain that came from the shock collar was completely, utterly indescribable, his lifepoints spiraling down as the electricity flared through him and sent him to his hands and nees, eyes tearing up and mouth watering, his entire body racked with tremors as he panted for breath_ _

__"Finally I'll use my Cat Of Ill Omens to destroy your Fox Fire and end my turn,"_ _

__Stiles felt like he was going to throw up, his head was spinning, his hands were trembling, he could barely even draw a card as he forced himself back to his feet_ _

__"I... I play..... Dian... Keto... The Cure Master... to.... raise my l-.. life points.... by a thousand," he panted_ _

__"And thanks to... my Fox Fire's.... special ability... he returns to the... the feild... automatically from... the graveyard..."_ _

__Theo chuckled again, sounding more thrilled than ever_ _

__"Is that really all you've got? You're going to reget not trying harder Stiles, because I'm about to send you to a graveyard of your own, a _real_ graveyard!"_ _

__That didn't sound good..._ _

__"First I sacrifice my Magician Of Faith to activate my Tribute Doll, wich I'll then use to summon Thousand Year Dragon, then I'll place another card face down and order my Cat Of Ill Omen to destroy your Fox Fire- PERMENANTELY this time,"_ _

__Stiles cursed, but it had been in defense mode, no real damage to his life points... just a damaged plan...._ _

__"You're lucky my dragon can't attack this turn, now make your move,"_ _

__He didn't understand... his dragon was weaker than Stiles' soldier, so if he was so intent on it... then one of his face-down cards must be something that could stop or weaken his attack..._ _

__And further more, why had Theo announced what monster he was summoning if he was keeping the feild in the dark? Unless he was trying to lure Stiles out into an attack by telling him that he had a monster weaker than Black Luster Soldier...._ _

__Swallowing tightly, he drew a card and hoped for the best_ _

__"First I place one card face down... then summon Battle Ox in defense mode," he said slowly_ _

__He could attack_ _

__He could attack the dragon or the castle, but Theo seemed to be way too smug and it may be better for him to wait_ _

__No... he KNEW it would be better to wait, if he attacked now he would be in serious trouble_ _

__"Now I'll end my turn,"_ _

__"Oh Stiles," Theo smirked_ _

__"You should have tried to take atleast ONE of my monsters down with you, now you'll go down without a fight! Thanks to one of my magic cards, I'm going to be summoning your demise! Your move,"_ _

__He didn't have a choice anymore_ _

__He _had_ to know what was on Theo's side of the feild if he had any hope of defeating it, and the card he had drawn wouldn't help him do that_ _

__..._ _

__But it WOULD help later...._ _

__"I place two cards face down... and then I order my Black Luster Soldier to destroy your Castle Of Dark Illusions!"_ _

__He could hear Theo chuckling, and he immediately felt his chest clench with panic_ _

__He watched with fear as a spinning metal collar suddenly sprang out from the shadows and wrapped it's self around his Flower Wolf's neck, causing the beast to snarl and howl as it tried to shake the collar off, but to no avail_ _

__He knew what that collar was...._ _

__"I activate Ring Of Destruction! Now the attack you were aiming at my castle will be deflected to your wolf instead!"_ _

__"Not this time Theo- activate! Shift!"_ _

__The collar suddenly dissappeared from his wolf, wrapping it's self around his Battle Ox instead before crushing it to smitherines_ _

__But atleast he wouldn't lose life points..._ _

__He swallowed tightly, his heart thundering in his chest_ _

__If he didn't do something to get rid of that castle and illuminate the feild, he was done for..._ _

__But the card he drew didn't help with that!_ _

__He was just going to have to try again, and hope to god that he could pull it off..._ _

__"First I lay two cards face down on the feild, then I'm going to play Axe Of Despair and equip my Flower Wolf with it, raising his attack points from 1,800 to 2,800, more than enough to take out your castle- wich is exactly what I'm going to attack!"_ _

__The axe emerged in the wolf's mouth and it charged forward, Stiles' heart pounding with hope as the wolf leapt into the shadows_ _

__Unfortunately... what followed was a pained wimpering and the sound of his life points draining, a scream tearing out of Stiles' throat as the electricity poured into his body_ _

__"N-No..... what... happened to... to my wolf!?" he shouted, panting desperately as he doubled over, trying his hardest not to puke_ _

__Theo chuckled, then cackled, then full-body laughed_ _

__"I used my newest monster to defend my castle ofcourse,"_ _

__If he used his newest monster.... then that monster must have over 2,800 attack points....._ _

__And if that was the case, it could easily have three thousand or more, meaning... it could destroy his Black Luster Soldier...._ _

__"Now, say goodbye to your soldier! My newest monster... take the Gravity Axe I revived for you and destroy his soldier!!! Once that pesky soldier is gone Stiles, your life points will be wide open for an attack by my dragon, and then you'll be stuck in the dark forever,"_ _

__Something was rushing out of the shadows, but Stiles did have a trick or two up his sleeve...._ _

__"Reveal face-down cards! Magic Jammer and Reinforcements!! First my Magic Jammer will destroy your axe once again, at the cost of card from my hand,"_ _

__He paused, discarding one of his cards to the graveyard and watching as the bright magic circle clenched around the axe and illuminated- ..._ _

__"A.... A Black Luster Soldier...?!"_ _

__Theo had a soldier too...?_ _

__But what were the odds of both of them having such a rare and hard-to-summon card on the feild at the same time!?_ _

__"Luckily for me, my soldier's attack points are raised by five hundred now thanks to my Reinforcements card, meaning that he can skewer your's!"_ _

__"I really don't think it's that easy," Theo purred_ _

__"What...?"_ _

__Stiles watched then in horror as his soldier swung his sword down on the other.... and then _shattered_ to peices!!_ _

__Stiles screamed louder as his life points drained, electricity shocking him again and again as he fell to his hands and nees once more, having to take breath in by the gulps_ _

__"I.. I don't... understand.."_ _

__"That's because you're a third-rate duelist Stiles, and my dragon is about to prove that,"_ _

___Third.... rate....?_ _ _

__He couldn't let Theo win_ _

__He absolutely couldn't let Theo win..._ _

__"Now my Thousand Year Dragon! Attack his life points directly!!"_ _

__"Mystical Elf! Rise up and defend me!" Stiles shouted, still panting for breath as his face-down Elf rose to a face-up position, taking the blow from the dragon- and protecting his life points wile she was at it_ _

__"You're done Stiles, you have no cards on the feild except for a spell card that you can't even use and a face-down card that's been on the feild so long, I think you've forgotten what it even is!! No matter what you draw this turn, it's over for you!"_ _

__What if Theo was right...?_ _

__His hand sucked!!_ _

__He needed an entire replacement hand but... how...?_ _

__"Even better for me, you attacked me with your Black Luster Soldier, and thanks to the Enchanted Javalin I had face down, I now get to add an extra three-thousand life points to my count, that being your Soldier's attack power,"_ _

__He was crushed..._ _

__Theo just kept gaining life points and the electricity barely seemed to do any real damage..._ _

___"STILES!!"_ _ _

__Jerking his head up, he stared over his shoulder suddenly, shock flooding through him as Derek appeared in the doorway_ _

__"D...Derek...?"_ _

__"Just hang on! I'm getting you out of that thing,"_ _

__"Oh I doubt that very much," Theo cackled_ _

__"Those cuffs are laced with Wolfsbane and not even your freakish strength can tear them apart,"_ _

__Wolfsbane...?_ _

__What did that have to do with anything?_ _

__Derek cursed, gritting his teeth and rushing over, a frustrated look on his face_ _

__"I don't care, I'll find a way!"_ _

__"No Derek," Stiles breathed, slowly, shakily rising up to his feet_ _

__"What? Stiles-"_ _

__"No! I... I made you a promise... this guy has one of your cards and he isn't going to get a second one, not until I've given up every last lifepoint," he insisted, dragging the back of his hand across his mouth as he felt blood start to trickle out_ _

__He hoped it was just because he had bitten his tongue when he was shocked the last time, otherwise...._ _

__"If that's the case... then you'd better use that card of mine or there was no use in you having it to begin with,"_ _

__Stiles blinked, staring at Derek in shock_ _

__He had thought they'd gotten past all of the harsh words... unless...._ _

__"I activate my face down card... Beta Dice!"_ _

__He flipped the card up, quickly reading the rules... and feeling a small, tiny spark of hope starting to bloom in his chest_ _

__"With this card.... I can return the same number of cards from the graveyard as the number I roll on the dice... cards of _any_ persuasion, and even better? I can revive them at _any_ point during the game," he said with a slight smirk_ _

__"That card is a power trip," Theo hissed_ _

__"Maybe, but it's _my_ power trip now," Stiles smirked_ _

__"Now... dice roll!"_ _

__He was tensing, bracing himself desperately as he waited for the dice to stop rolling_ _

__Four.... five...... ** _SIX!!_**_ _

__Now Stiles _knew_ he could win_ _

__"For my first card, I revive Card Destruction! Meaning we both have to replace our hands now,"_ _

__He discarded his hand, then drew six new cards..._ _

__And he could use _all_ of them_ _

__Grinning to himself, he placed two cards face down, eyes shimmering with delight_ _

__"Now I place two cards face down, summon Neo The Magic Swordsman in defense mode, and play.... Swords Of Revealing Light!"_ _

__"What!? NO!" Theo shouted_ _

__"Yes! Thanks to my swords, not only are you unable to attack for three turns, but now your side of the feild is illuminated as well, and I can see _all_ of your cards,"_ _

__The swords rained down from the sky, fencing in his dragon and his- .... what...?_ _

__"Relinquish...? So you never had your own Black Luster Soldier at all.... it was just Relinquish mimicking him!"_ _

__Wich was why his soldier had been destroyed..._ _

__"Are you done yet?" Theo hissed_ _

__"Sure... go right ahead and make your move," Stiles smirked_ _

__Theo snorted, irritation in his eyes as he drew a new card_ _

__"I set two cards face down on the feild... and end my turn,"_ _

___Perfect_ _ _

__"Good, now... first things first, reveal face down card! Just Desserts!"_ _

__Theo winced, gritting his teeth hard_ _

__"You may remember this little number, it'll reduce your life points by five hundred for each monster you have on the feild and right now? I count three, so say goodbye to fifteen hundred lifepoints!"_ _

__Theo screamed louder than he ever had before this time, his legs wobbling, about to give out, but he forced himself to stay upright, even as the electricity rushed through him_ _

__"Next, I'm going to use Change Of Heart to take control of your Relinquished!"_ _

__Theo hissed in displeasure, watching his monster turn and transfer to Stiles' side of the feild_ _

__"And then... I'm going to use Soul Exchange to sacrifice your Thousand Year Dragon, and I'll sacrifice my newly acquired Relinquished, to bring out... my Red Eyes Black Dragon!"_ _

__Summoning Red Eyes had become his favorite thing in the world, and the power he felt when he slammed the card down onto the feild and the holograms wooped and wirled to bring the dragon forth was.... _exhilarating....__ _

__"Finally I'll play Dian Keto The Cure Master to boost my life points by a thousand, and Pot Of Greed to draw two more cards from my deck, both thanks to Derek's Beta Dice,"_ _

__Theo cursed, wrinkling his nose as he drew a card_ _

__"First I'm going to summon Nin-Ken Dog in defense mode, then I'll activate Ultimate Offering so that I can summon Witch Of The Black Forest- also in defense mode," he announced, wincing as the power of his trap card cost him five hundred life points_ _

__"Then... I'll play one card face down, and activate my trap card- Dissappear! That will remove one card from your graveyard from play and I'm choosing your Black Luster Soldier,"_ _

__Stiles smirked, chuckling softly_ _

__"Unfortunately for you, I'm now activating a trap of my own- Dust Tornado! Wich will negate and destroy your Dissappear card!"_ _

__Theo cursed under his breath, starting to look worse for wear as he wobbled a little on his feet_ _

__The duel was close now..._ _

__They were both starting to get low on life points, even with Stiles' boost, and he knew he needed to end this before it was too late and Theo recovered..._ _

__"Now I use my dice card's special ability for the last time! Bring back to me my Maha Vailo in defense mode, then bring back my Black Luster Soldier, and a monster card to lay face down, I'm laying one more card face down, before ordering my Red Eyes Black Dragon to destroy your Castle Of Dark Illusions once and for all!"_ _

__Theo sneered in anger as the castle was destroyed, but as it was in defense mode, he didn't lose any life points_ _

__"I'm not done yet..." Theo sneered_ _

__"First I sacrifice my Nin-Ken Dog to bring forth Octoberser, then I'll place two cards face down and play Monster Reborn to bring Relinquished back to the feild, and I'm choosing for him to immitate your Black Luster Soldier again,"_ _

__Stiles frowned, gritting his teeth in irritation_ _

__But it was really only a minor set-back_ _

__"Fine then, first I'm going to place one card face down, then I'm going to use my Red Eyes Black Dragon to blast away your Octoberser!"_ _

__"I don't think so, I now activate Power Of Kaishin, wich will boost my monster's attack points by three hundred, and Reinforcements, wich will boost it by another five hundred, officially making it the same strength as your dragon!"_ _

__"Wrong again," Stiles grinned_ _

__"I reveal one of my face-down cards- Dragon Treasure! Increasing my dragon's attack points by another three hundred and officially making it stronger than your.... whatever the hell that thing is,"_ _

__Theo screamed as his monster was blasted away, his life points ticking down and electricity flooding through him once again_ _

__"I'm not done though, I'm revealing my face-down card- Magician Of Faith, who allows me to bring back one spell card from the graveyard, and I choose Tribute Doll!"_ _

__"Tribute Doll? What the hell could you possibly have left to summon!?"_ _

__Stiles was grinning so broadly that his body almost stopped aching- .... almost_ _

__"You're about to find out... with the help of my Tribute Doll, I sacrifice it and my Maha Vailo, to bring forth.... Sorceror Of Dark Magic!"_ _

__"What!? That... that can't be..."_ _

__"Oh but he is, say hello to the Dark Magician's more powerfull cousin!"_ _

__It was an extremely rare card, but it was one that he and Scott both had in their decks_ _

__Stiles had wanted so badly to have a Dark Magician in his deck so he would feel connected to his freind- who was practically the master of Dark Magicians- that when one had come up in a rare card shop, Scott had spent some of his prize money from Duelist Kingdom to buy it for him_ _

__(Not that it had even _scratched_ three million dollars but still)_ _

__Now it was his second favorite card, right behind Red Eyes_ _

__"That... that can't be...."_ _

__Stiles smirked, his eyes bright with delight_ _

__"Now my Sorceror, destroy his Relinquished!"_ _

__Theo screamed, his life points ticking down, down, down... there were only a few hundred left_ _

__"And finally," Stiles grinned_ _

__"Black Luster Soldier, destroy his witch!"_ _

__The witch had been in defense mode, meaning that there were still a few hundred life points left, but Stiles could handle that_ _

__"I... I summon... Petite Angel in defense mode," Theo coughed, having to clutch tightly onto the wall to keep from collapsing_ _

__"And lay.... two cards.... face down..."_ _

__"I hope they aren't traps, because if they are, my Sorceror can destroy them on sight,"_ _

__Surely enough, as Theo's eyes widened, the Sorceror aimed his staff and obliterated the trap cards on the feild, and now that the turn was back to Stiles...._ _

__"Sorcerer Of Dark Magic, destroy the Petite Angel!"_ _

__He didn't even feel bad when the little thing squealed out and burst into peices, especially not with what was coming next..._ _

__"And finally... Red Eyes Black Dragon, attack Theo's life points directly and end this insane duel!!"_ _

__His Red Eyes inhaled, then blew out a spiraling ball of fire, Theo's screams filling the air as the fireball depleted his life points down to zero, and his shock collar burst with electricity, nocking him down officially to his nees_ _

__Stiles took a few heavy breaths, shaking as his monsters dissappeared from the feild and the cuffs around his ankles finally loosened_ _

__He hit the ground, gulping in air and shaking like a leaf_ _

__"Stiles!!" Derek shouted, hurrying to his side and dropping down next to him_ _

__"I.... I'm ok..." he gasped, offering his freind- were they freinds now? It was a little hard to tell- a weak smile and shakily offering him the Dice card he had in his duel disk_ _

__"I... believe this belongs to you,"_ _

__Derek smiled gently, graciously accepting it and sliding it in his pocket_ _

__"Thank you.."_ _

__"Yeah but... you owe... you owe me.... two questions.... once I get Freako's ... Dice card too..."_ _

__"Stiles, after this I owe you atleast _four_ questions," Derek sighed back playfully_ _

__Stiles smiled weakly, resisting the urge to lean in as Derek placed a hand on his shoulder_ _

__"Come on, let's get you out of here," he said quietly, taking Stiles' hand and carefully helping him to his feet_ _

__"I'm not done..." Stiles heard, eyes widening as he glanced at the feild where Theo was currently neeling, heaving breaths as he shakily drew a card and slid it onto the disk on his arm_ _

__"Your life points.. haven't cleared yet so.. Element Valkyrie.... give .. give him a shock!!"_ _

__Stiles' eyes widened, fumbling to grab a card and reactivate his duel disk, but Derek was one step ahead- literally and figuratively_ _

__"Oh I don't think so," he sneered, stepping in front of Stiles and quickly drawing a card of his own_ _

__"Blue Eyes White Dragon!! Defend Stiles and shock this cheater into oblivion!"_ _

__Stiles was absolutely breathless as he watched the Blue Eyes take the feild, a dragon even more majestic and powerfull than his own_ _

__And Derek...._ _

__Derek looked so confident and beautifull whenever he weilded it, especially now, as the dragon reeled back and released a lightening blast at the other monster, Theo being _thoroughly_ shocked thanks to the collar around his neck as consequence_ _

__Derek didn't deactivate his disk until Theo was on the floor, eyes pale and dead, and no chance of coming back_ _

__"Thank you..." Stiles said quietly_ _

__"I should be the one thanking you," Derek frowned, putting an arm around Stiles' waist and leading him to sit down on the edge of the rink, walking forward to take a star chip out of Theo's gauntlet, as well as remove his deck from the disk_ _

__"Hn.... and to think, the Dice card would have been his next draw..." Derek mused absently_ _

__"Wow, talk about timing," Stiles grinned back_ _

__"No kidding," Derek smirked back, walking back over to him and gently handing him the chip_ _

__"You MORE than earned that,"_ _

__Stiles nodded slowly, sighing as he placed it into his gauntlet_ _

__He was only at eleven.... he was sure everyone else had qualified for finals buy now but..._ _

__Suddenly something caught the corner of his eye, bringing him to jerk his head up and watch as some creepy looking guy with an activated duel disk slithered out from the shadows_ _

__Without thinking or hesitating, Stiles reactivated his duel disk and grabbed his Red Eyes, slamming it down on top of the playing feild_ _

__"Red Eyes! Kill that creep!!"_ _

__By the time Derek even turned his head, Red Eyes was already blasting a fireball at the stranger, easily distracting him enough for Derek to growl and run forward_ _

__Stiles felt, for a moment, like he must have been dreaming as claws and fangs sprouted forth from Derek's fingernails and teeth, but then he saw the older man bring those claws down on the stranger with the duel disk and.. all of a sudden it didn't seem so much like a dream_ _

__Stiles heard footsteps behind him, jerking with surprise as as a beautifull tawny wolf ran from the entrance of the room over to where Derek had just taken down a dude with his _claws__ _

__"I'm not sure who you are..." Derek growled, smirking as he stood up_ _

__"But I'd like to introduce you to my sister,"_ _

__And without hesitation, the tawny wolf jumped forward and tore out the jugular of the stranger as he screamed and writhed on the ground_ _

__It was.... spectacularly violent...._ _

__And he looked kind of familiar when Stiles really looked at him, was that the guy who had tazed him earlier...?_ _

__Derek turned around, a sad look crossing his face as his features shifted back to normal- including the red eyes and pointed ears that Stiles had neglected to notice before- and started walking closer_ _

__"I'm ... sorry you had to see that Stiles,"_ _

__The younger duelist gulped, shaking his head slowly and releasing a slow breath_ _

__"No it's... ok, I mean, you saved me like .. twice probably, I just... I'm not hallucinating am I? About the.... _grrr_?" he asked, making little fangs with his fingers_ _

__"You aren't hallucinating, dreaming, having a mental break down or anything else like that, we're... ah...-"_ _

__"Werewolves?"_ _

__"Right,"_ _

__"Cool, I mean... that's... really cool, Duel Monster playing werewolves, that's awesome,"_ _

__Derek frowned, eyes narrowing_ _

__"You seem disturbingly nonplussed by that,"_ _

__"Ok first of all, _nonplussed_? Really? Second of all... somehow werewolves aren't the weirdest thing I've seen in the last few years, Duelist Kingdom had some strange birds Derek,"_ _

__"But.... _werewolves_?"_ _

__"Yeah well, there was a guy living in a big gold ring too but-"_ _

___"What?"_ _ _

__"What what?"_ _

__Derek sighed heavily, closing his eyes and shaking his head_ _

__"I think you're concussed.... and we need to get you to a hospital anyway, there's no telling what all of that electricity did to you,"_ _

__"No way, I'm not leaving here until I get my last two star chips!"_ _

__"Wha-... Stiles!!"_ _

__"No, nuh-uh, not gonna happen, I am winning those star chips and that's that, I'm getting to the finals and if I wait until morning to come back there'll be no one left!"_ _

__Derek frowned deeper, eyes narrowed_ _

__"If you are not very carefull, your possessions will possess you,"_ _

__"Don't try to use a Marina And The Diamonds lyric against me Derek Hale! I am becoming my own self-fullfilled prophecy weather you like it or not!"_ _

__"God you're stubborn," Derek hissed, pausing for a moment and narrowing his eyes_ _

__"Fair comeback though," he mused, grumbling to himself as he walked back towards the bloody corpse that Cora was currently sniffing at and bending down, peeling a star chip out of his gauntlet_ _

__"Here, you did technically defeat him so ... it counts," he said, handing the chip over_ _

__"But-"_ _

__" _It counts_ ,"_ _

__Stiles took it reluctantly, far too tired to argue over something so petty, and carefully took the chip, inserting it into his gauntlet_ _

__"And here, I won an extra, consider it a gift after all you've done for me," Derek said suddenly, fishing a chip out of his pocket and holding it out towards the other duelist_ _

__" _No_ , I have not come all this way to accept charity,"_ _

__" _Stiles_!!!!"_ _

__"No! I am winning my last chip fair and square Derek Hale and there's nothing you can do about it!!"_ _

__Derek gritted his teeth, getting ready to tell Stiles that he would be going to the hospital even if Derek had to drag him there kicking and screaming, when another voice interrupted the argument_ _

__"I'll duel you,"_ _

__Stiles' head jerked up, a relieved smile crossing his face as he stumbled up to his feet_ _

__"Malia!! You're ok!!"_ _

__"Did you really think I wouldn't be?" Malia smirked back, easily making her way towards him_ _

__"Well, things were a little sketchy for a second there..."_ _

__She only shrugged, not seeming to care_ _

__"So, are we dueling or what?"_ _

__Stiles blinked, glancing down at her gauntlet and frowning a little_ _

__"But... you only have four star chips..... how will you ever get to the finals now if you waste one of them?"_ _

__"Ok, first of all, stop assuming that you're going to win, second of all, it wouldn't be a waste if it was for you, and third of all.... do you _really_ think I'm going to win nine more star chips _tonight_ at this point?"_ _

__"...Fair..." Stiles said slowly_ _

__"Besides, I've been aching to duel again since those creeps took me, so let's do this before you collapse of a heart attack or something,"_ _

__Stiles smiled lightly, nodding before wincing and rubbing his neck_ _

__"Actually... can I get this thing off of me first? And .. sit down wile we duel?"_ _

__"I can take care of that," Lydia volunteered, taking a step out of the shadows and smirking as she waved around her travel sized manicure kit_ _

__"And I saw some chairs in the other room, I'll get them," Erica added as she stepped behind Lydia_ _

__"Erica? What the hell are you doing here?"_ _

__"She helped save Malia and I, it's a long story, we'll talk later," Lydia said quickly_ _

__Stiles had learned that when it came to Lydia, it was best not to argue, so he only nodded slowly and moved to sit on the edge of the arena again, trying to stay still as Lydia moved to sit next to him and start tinkering with his collar_ _

__"Get ready Stiles, I'm not going easy on you," Malia smirked_ _

__"Wouldn't dream of it, I just hope you still manage to get into the finals," Stiles smirked back_ _

__"Oh that shouldn't be a problem, I'm sure Cousin Derek can hook me up,"_ _

__"For the last time Malia- _NO_ ," Derek frowned_ _

__"Wah- ... _Cousin_ Derek!?"_ _

__"My side of the family is kind of ..... estranged...... it's a long story and you don't need to know,"_ _

___Don't need to know_ his left eye...._ _

__"So you.... you're aware of all of this? About the dice and the... the company and the werewolves?"_ _

__"Yep, when Dungeon Dice started up Derek told me to keep an eye on all of you losers and make sure nothing _too_ bad happened, do you think it was a coincidence that we met at the dice tournament but I never played?"_ _

__"I didn't play either," Stiles pouted, nose wrinkling_ _

__"So you sent Malia to spy on us?"_ _

__"I was _desperate_ and you five were acting like complete morons,"_ _

__"Yeah well you know what? You both suck, Lydia's my new favorite now,"_ _

__Lydia paused, eyebrows raised as she moved her tweazers towards the back of the collar_ _

__"When did I ever stop being your current favorite?"_ _

__"Ahhh..."_ _

__There was no good answer to that_ _

___There was no good answer to that_ _ _

__"Stiles... can I ask you a question now?" Derek asked quietly_ _

__"Huh? .. Well, yeah, I guess so,"_ _

__"Why are you so desperate to win this tournament? You just... don't strike me as the pridefull or greedy type..."_ _

__"No, it isn't that," he said quietly, shaking his head_ _

__"My dad... he had a heart attack a couple of years ago, his medical bills are ... unreal.... and he had to put the house on a second mortage.... I want to win the prize money so that I can pay all of that off, give him a break before he works himself into another heart attack trying to do it himself,"_ _

__Derek looked positively heart-broken by that, and Stiles immediately spoke again to keep him from saying something stupid_ _

__"And I swear to God Hale, if you offer me charity I'll cut you,"_ _

__Derek sighed softly, giving a small shrug_ _

__"Point taken,"_ _

__Though knowing Derek, he would probably find some way to annonymously pay everything off anyway_ _

__..._ _

__Stiles couldn't say that would be the worst thing, really..._ _

__"Well, you're almost there," Lydia smiled, finally getting the collar off of him as Erica arrived with the chairs_ _

__"All you have to do is beat Malia and you'll be in the finals, how hard can that be?"_ _

__"You know something Lydia? I'm starting to get tired of you," Malia frowned_ _

__"Sweetie, you have four star chips, _be realistic_ ,"_ _

__"Yeah and I also have a Crush card, and it could definitely _Crush_ any of your fancy overpowered monsters,"_ _

__Stiles just heaved a quiet sigh as they argued, eyes closing for a breif moment_ _

__It was good to have things back to normal_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__"Well I bet that has to feel good, finally having your last star chip,"_ _

__"It does," Stiles agreed with a relieved nod_ _

__Finally... he had all the chips he needed to get to the finals_ _

__"Good, now let's get out of here before you collapse, you look like hell,"_ _

__"Gee thanks Hot Stuff," Stiles snorted in faux annoyance as Derek grabbed the helmet off of his motercycle and gently placed it over Stiles' head_ _

__"I'm serious Stiles, you look like crap, we need to get you to a doctor _now_ ,"_ _

__"But.. my star chips... I wanna cash 'em..." he pouted back, nose wrinkling as Derek snapped the safety latch on the helmet to keep it in place_ _

__God he was such a _mom_ for someone with that much facial hair and that dramatic of a coat..._ _

__"I'll tell you what, I'll cash them for you after I drop you off and then you can go to the finals tommorrow, ok?"_ _

__Part of him hated that Derek was just going to drop him off at the hospital instead of staying with him, but the guy was busier than ever between the tournament finals and the crap from tonight, so it was understandable_ _

__Besides, it wasn't like they were close enough for that anyway, right?_ _

__"Fine.... but I atleast want to brag to Scott, do you know if he's cashed in his yet?"_ _

__Derek gave a quick shake to his head, pausing slightly and frowning_ _

__"Cora, did you send anyone out to get him earlier?"_ _

__"Yeah, I tracked their disks like you said and sent Boyd and Isaac after him, Argent, and Kira Yukimura, Scott and Kira were together at the time and Argent was somewhere else... I could track them down again if you want,"_ _

__Cora had long since gotten some clothes from somewhere or other- Stiles guessed that they had stashed clothes all over the park for reasons like this- and was now tinkering with an iPad as she walked lazily towards them_ _

__"I'm sure they're fine, Allison is probably still sulking and I bet Scott and Kira are having a victory screw,"_ _

__Everyone- _everyone_ \- paused and looked up at Malia with a mixture of disgust and concern, to wich she only rolled her eyes_ _

__"Oh please, you know they are,"_ _

__Derek sighed quietly, shaking his head and looking down at Stiles again, eyebrows raising suddenly and a smirk crossing his face as he reached out and gently grabbed the edges of Stiles' shirt_ _

__"A Blue Eyes shirt huh? Wow, didn't know you were such a fan,"_ _

__"Oh shove off, I had to replace my _real_ shirt after Allison spilled coke on it! You're the freak of nature who only stocked the souvineer stops with Blue Eyes crap,"_ _

__Though speaking of wich, that had probably been when Allison had put that stuff in his pocket, when he really thought about it, he knew that napkin thing had seemed weird..._ _

__"Well I wouldn't be too dissappointed, it looks good on you," Derek hummed, causing a blush to make it's way onto Stiles' face_ _

__"And just so you know, everything else will be well stocked by the time the park opens to the public,"_ _

__"Uh-huh, sure," Stiles grumbled back, rubbing the back of his neck and blinking in surprise when he felt the tiny metal chain rubbing up against his skin_ _

__"Oh right.... you don't have any idea what this is do you? I think Allison put it in my pocket with the card... Theo said something about it protecting me from theives or...?"_ _

__Derek nodded slowly, a bittersweet smile crossing his face as Stiles unclasped it and handed it to him for examination_ _

__"It's.... it's mine, actually," he said quietly_ _

__"It's hard to explain without going into detail but... it's a key, my mother had it designed before I was even born, it went missing in the ruckus of the fire, I had assumed she had been wearing it when she died but ... then I saw it listed as a prize at the Dungeon Dice tournament,"_ _

__"They... they stole this too?" Stiles breathed_ _

__"Sure they did, the cards were out of jealousy but the necklace... that was just to rub in our faces,"_ _

__"Let me guess, the other thing you wanted from Scott?"_ _

__"Yeah, Lydia told me earlier though that Allison had gotten it back from him, she must have swapped it with you as extra protection," he shrugged, not making eye contact_ _

__Stiles didn't even care how or why she did it at this point, his heart was aching so much for Derek that all he wanted to do was wrap the guy up in a hug and right all the wrongs that had ever happened in his life_ _

__"I'm so sorry," he said quietly_ _

__Derek only shrugged again, gripping the necklace a little tighter before smiling at Stiles again_ _

__"It's... it's alright, it's back now, thanks to you,"_ _

__Stiles was lucky he didn't have to come up with some way to respond to that, given that Cora was quick to interrupt them_ _

__"Um guys... we have a problem..."_ _

__"Let me guess, their duel disks are missing?" Lydia asked blandly_ _

__"Worse, they're all at our security office, as well as several other registered duel disks..."_ _

__"Let's go then," Stiles said quickly_ _

__" _ **NO!**_ _Absolutely_ not," Derek frowned_ _

__"I am not going to tell you again Stiles: _you need to see a doctor_ , God only knows what all that electricity did to you! So you're going back to the medical bay at Hale Corp, and you two," Derek paused, looking directly at Lydia and Malia the way a lion might try to stare down prey_ _

__"You're going with him to make sure he doesn't escape, we're going to find out what's going on with your freinds and we're going _alone_ ,"_ _

__"Bite me Hale!"_ _

__"Do you really want to ask me to do that?" Derek asked dryly_ _

__"I'm not going anywhere until I find out what happened to my freinds!"_ _

__" _God_ why do you have to have this annoying anime charector stubborn trait!?"_ _

__"It's a loyalty trait and you should be talking _Wolfman_!"_ _

__"Well, he's not wrong Derek," Erica noted_ _

__Derek spun around, pointing at her and frowning_ _

__" _You_ hush,"_ _

__"I'm going weather you like it or not," Stiles said, getting on the motercycle and holding his grip tightly on the handlebars_ _

__"The only question is if I'm driving or not,"_ _

__"Do you even know how to ride one of these things?"_ _

__"Nope,"_ _

__"Get off,"_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__The moment they entered the top floor of the security office, Derek tensed, turning pale and looking completely panicked_ _

__Stiles didn't see why really_ _

__Sure his freinds and some of Derek's employees were tied up and surrounded by goons with their duel disks activated but he shouldn't look _this_ stark_ _

__Unless his focus is on someone else, someone like the leader..._ _

__She was a young to middle-aged woman with pale skin and dark ringlet curls, brown eyes and a charming smile_ _

___Too charming_ _ _

__"Long time no see Derek,"_ _

___"Jennifer,"_ he spat_ _

__"Um... who is this?" Stiles wispered to Cora_ _

__"A witch who tried to take Derek's soul once after she tricked him into having sex with her, it didn't end well,"_ _

__"Oh," he said softly, leaning away again to face the aforementioned witch_ _

__"Surprised to see me?"_ _

__"I wish I could say yes, but really I'm just annoyed," Derek huffed back_ _

__"That's not very nice... and after I went to all the trouble of modifying your favorite game for you," she pouted_ _

__"Modifying...? Modifying how?"_ _

__Jennifer smirked, eyes lighting up as she glanced out the window and down at the ground_ _

__"Fun story, you see I laid a very special spell around this building and the twenty-five yards surrounding it, any of your little monster cards to be put on one of your.. hologram... disc things within this circle will not be summoned as a hologram, but as a _real monster_ ,"_ _

__"A real monster?" Derek repeated_ _

__"Exactly, a real, living, breathing, monster, that could tear you limb from limb,"_ _

__Derek nodded slowly, humming quietly in consideration_ _

__"And... our cards are affected too?"_ _

__"Ofcourse,"_ _

__"And.... do you have to obey the rules of the game to summon a monster?"_ _

__"Well.. I'm not actually sure, I've never really been interested in this game, wich is why I hired Theo's pack to work for me, they're a bunch of gamers so I figured they would know what they were doing and how to track down the rest of those cards your mother designed, looks like I was atleast partly right... but regardless, it doesn't matter if there were rules or not, they're monsters, wild beasts, they're not going to listen to you," Jennifer grinned_ _

__"Now... hand over your cards, or my .... _associates...._ will draw the most powerfull card in their deck and destroy you,"_ _

__As if to make good on her promise, one of the goons laid a card down on the duel disk, presenting before them a living, breathing........_ _

__..._ _

__Beaver Warrior_ _

__..._ _

__Stiles and Derek grinned at eachother, wasting no time before activiating their duel disks and drawing the first card on each of their decks_ _

__The Blue Eyes White Dragon and Red Eyes Black Dragon respectively_ _

__Derek's only regret was that the entire back of his main security office would have to be replaced come Monday_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__''How did she even get ahold of any star chips without having a clue how to duel?" Cora frowned gently removing the tape from around Kira's mouth_ _

__"Obviously she had goons giving them to her," Stiles mused as he took the final Dice card out of the pocket of Jennifer's vest_ _

__She really hadn't known what had hit her with those dragons..._ _

___Good_ _ _

__"Here," he said softly, handing it up to Derek and giving him a gentle smile_ _

__Derek smiled softly back, slowly taking the card and putting it in his pocket with the rest_ _

__"Mine too," Scott said suddenly, shocking both Derek and Stiles as he stepped forward and held out his two Dice cards_ _

__"Allison told me everything, or ... atleast what I THINK was everything, these don't belong to me, they never did,"_ _

__Derek felt a small, emotional smile crossing over his face as he slowly took the cards from the other duelist, looking up at the sound of Lydia clearing her throat, handing her own Dice card towards him_ _

__"Far be it from me to be the last hold out, though... I AM keeping the necklace Allison had made for me," she said with a small smirk_ _

__And just like that, he had all of the cards back- and the duplicate necklace... well, he couldn't bring himself to really care about that at the moment, his heart was practically _soaring__ _

__"For the record," Allison said slowly, catching his attention_ _

__"I don't approve of what my aunt and grandfather did, I didn't know what they had done when I started promoting Dice Monsters, I... I only found out recently, I'm sorry all of this had to happen,"_ _

__"Well it didn't _have_ to happen, just saying," Stiles muttered back, still somewhat bitter about the entire thing_ _

__"Thank you for the apology," Derek said quietly, wich was more than he had said to anyone with the Argent name in ages_ _

__If ever_ _

__"On a happier note, it looks like everyone here is now officially a finalist in the first ever Hale Corp Monster Land Dueling Tournament!" Erica beamed_ _

__"Everyone?" Derek frowned, glancing over his shoulder and narrowing his eyes at Malia_ _

__"Put them back,"_ _

__"Wha.. they are't using them!"_ _

__" _Malia_...."_ _

__She growled and grumbled to herself, nose wrinkled and clearly displeased, but started popping the star chips out of her gauntlet anyway_ _

__"Cora, why don't you take them to cash their chips? I need to get Stiles out of here," he said softly, gently taking Stiles' hand again and removing his gauntlet before handing it to his sister_ _

__"I guess I can do that, looks like I won't be sleeping any time soon anyway," she said with an exaggerated eye roll_ _

__"Thanks," he nodded, taking Stiles' hand and leading him towards the exit of the office_ _

__"Let me guess, doctor?"_ _

__"Yep, but... there IS something I wanted to show you first,"_ _

__Stiles blinked in confusion, head tilting to the side_ _

__"There is?"_ _

__"Yeah... something you really earned,"_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__"So the Hale/Argent thing ... that's always been about wolves vs hunters?"_ _

__"For centuries now," Derek confirmed as the two of them walked through the woods_ _

__"Huh... for the record, I'm on your side,"_ _

__"I kind of thought you would be," Derek teased playfully, finally stopping at ... a tree_ _

__Just a plain ol' tree_ _

__"Um...."_ _

__He smirked over his shoulder at Stiles, springing his claws out and jamming them into the tree trunk_ _

__Seconds later the ground began to rumble, a simply stone tower rising up from the ground with four tiny slots carved into it_ _

__Derek reached into his pocket, pulling out three of his Dice cards- Alpha, Beta, and Omega- and inserted them into the three card-shaped slots, then pulled off his necklace and inserted the end into the small fourth_ _

__And moments later, the ground began to shake again, before it gave way to a huge stone stair case descending into the underground_ _

__Stiles was _stunned__ _

__Derek smiled gently at him, removing all of the keys from their locks before descending down the stairs_ _

__"You'd better hurry up, this staircase closes in fouty-five seconds_ _

__Jumping, Stiles hurried in after him, looking around in amazement even before there was really anything to see_ _

__"Who the hell came up with this place...?"_ _

__"I'm not sure honestly... I just know they're an old ancestor of mine, but my mom came up with the cards and necklace as keys idea, I know it's a little convoluted but... she was so proud of herself...."_ _

__"It looks like she has every reason to be," he smiled softly, reaching out and gently patting Derek on the back as they reached the bottom of the stairs- wich, as promised, had started to slowly ascend back to where it came from_ _

__Derek flipped on a light at the bottom, and suddenly the entire room- wich was freaking MASSIVE and alot more like an entire library than a single room- lit up with artificial light, revealing the most enormous collection of cards Stiles had ever seen- _easily__ _

__"Dear God...."_ _

__"Here is one copy of every Duel Monsters card ever created, as well as the digital base to print more if the need ever arose," he explained, walking towards the back of the room_ _

__Stiles followed, but much more slowly, wanting to take it all in, to look at each and every card on his way there_ _

__"So... you could print more rare cards now? Like... of .. your Blue Eyes?"_ _

__Derek paused, going quiet for a moment, even as he started walking again_ _

__"I could, but.... I'm not sure if I will,"_ _

__"Dude... what is WITH you and that card?"_ _

__"It... was Laura's favorite... she loved it to peices, always used it against me.. we all had one in our decks, it was like.. like a family tradition, the night of the fire, Laura had taken all of the copies we had home to polish the cards before being sold, as you know the original run of Blue Eyes cards ended decades ago, because we had a problem with our digital proof- though we never told anyone that that was why, Blue Eyes cards just... started dissappearing, I'm not totally sure why but... at the time we were planning on a big comeback for the card, the proof had been fixed, we were just waiting for the right opportunity to release the cards, the fire destroyed all of them, all except the one copy we keep here and the proof that goes with it, plus four, the one in my deck, the one in my mom's deck- wich she kept in her office- the one in Laura's spare deck that she kept in her own office, and Cora's, then .. as you know, a few years ago Cora's was destroyed when someone she challenged to a duel ripped it to peices... sore loser... so now I have the only three left, the only peices of my family that I could ever carry with me until now,"_ _

__That... broke his heart_ _

__And all of a sudden Stiles kind of just wanted to buy every peice of Blue Eyes material he could get his hands on..._ _

__"I'm sure I'll print more but ... for right now, I just want to keep them to myself a little longer... you know?"_ _

__"Ofcourse, that's totally understandable," Stiles promised quietly, watching Derek as he started laying the Dice cards in a special case in the back of the room_ _

__"How will you get in without those?"_ _

__"Mm, well, I'm only putting the nine non-key cards in here, I'm keeping the keys someplace special,"_ _

__"Is that what all of this has really been about? Those three key cards?"_ _

__"Basically, as if the cards in here and the ability to print them wasn't valuable enough, there are some other.... more magical things in this vault as well,"_ _

__"Really? Like what?"_ _

__"Nothing you should concern yourself with at the moment,"_ _

__Stiles pouted, leaning against the table behind him and taking a deep, fullfilling breath_ _

__But... it didn't feel quite right_ _

__Something felt off_ _

__"Thank you, for showing me this," Stiles said quietly_ _

__Derek turned around, smiling gently at him and taking a step closer_ _

__"Like I said, you earned it, you... _more_ than earned it," he promised_ _

__"Still-"_ _

__"Still nothing," Derek said softly, reaching out and gently cupping Stiles' face_ _

__The younger duelist swallowed, his heart practically sky-rocketing at the contact, beating erratically in his chest_ _

__"I could never repay you enough for what you did and... to say that I deeply admire you as both a duelist and a person... that puts it rather mildly,"_ _

__"Be carefull now Derek, one might start to think you're complimenting me," Stiles joked, barely keeping himself breathing even half-way normally at this point_ _

__"We wouldn't want that," Derek smirked just as teasingly, leaning down closer and closing his eyes_ _

__Stiles closed his eyes as well, his hands starting to shake as Derek gently, sweetly, brushed his lips against his_ _

__It drove Stiles breathless, that kiss...._ _

__...._ _

__No, no he .. he was really, _really_ breathless_ _

__"D-Derek..." he gasped, forcing the wolf to open his eyes and stare at him with concern_ _

__"Sti-?"_ _

__"I can't... I can't.... breathe...."_ _

__His legs buckled, his entire body seeming to seize up as he collapsed to the floor_ _

__"Stiles!? STILES!!!?"_ _

__The last thing he thought before passing out, was that Derek's face was, strangely enough, kind of a nice last sight to see_ _

__

__~+~_ _

__

__Stiles gasped loudly, jerking up in bed, his heart pounding in his chest as he glanced around_ _

__The room was dark, he was in a comfortable bed and wearing expensive, comfortable pajamas, but..._ _

__He was all alone, and he really hated that..._ _

__Sliding slowly out of bed, he wandered through the dark to the door, sliding it open and then making his way down the hall, using his hands to feel around for walls and bumps and corners_ _

__Finally the sight of a light caught his eyes and he breathed a sigh of releif, seeing it coming from the bottom of a staircase_ _

__He hurried down the steps, starting to panic at this point, but felt immense releif when he poked his head around the corner and saw Derek sitting in an arm chair by the wall_ _

__"Stiles, you're up," he said immediately, a look of surprise and releif spreading across his face_ _

__It was only a second later, as everyone else started to turn around, that he noticed how many other people were there_ _

__All of his freinds, Derek, Cora, Erica, and ... two complete and utter strangers_ _

__"Um... who are these two?" he asked suspiciously, pointing at the two men in mild concern_ _

__"Liam and Mason, the other two finalists for the tournament," Derek answered_ _

__"We all get to spend the night here in Derek's mansion until tommorrow afternoon when round two starts!" Kira beamed excitedly, her eyes lit up_ _

__Stiles could see that she too had already taken advantage of the free, nice pajamas...._ _

__"The location of the finals is still technically disclosed, just for extra insurance, surely you don't think we'd be having that kind of crap at our _house_ ," Cora mused with a smirk_ _

__"Well... as happy as I am to hear that the show will go on, can I... ask what happened?"_ _

__Suddenly the moderately peacefull and light tone in the room took a sharp edged turn for the unfortunate, Derek's light smile dropping into a deep frown_ _

__"You... had a heart-attack, Stiles... the electricity... I told you I thought something was wrong... it was a delayed reaction to the electric shocks you received during that duel.. by the time I would have gotten you to a hospital or .. even gotten an ambulance to you it would have been too late, your heart had already stopped twice by the time I got you out of my family's vault,"_ _

__"Vault?" Scott asked suddenly, clearly not having heard the entire story yet_ _

__"I... did the only thing I could do to save your life, I'm so sorry..."_ _

__Stiles was quiet for a few moments, thinking that over for a wile before it finally dawned on him what Derek must have meant_ _

__"Oh.... you mean... I'm gonna start having monthly appointments with the full moon?" he asked with raised eyebrows_ _

__Derek winced, as if Stiles had just slapped him in the face, and Cora gave a tense nod, answering for her brother_ _

__"Well... that's ok," he said with a small shrug, clearly catching Derek by surprise_ _

__"It- ... what?"_ _

__"It's fine, I mean, it's better than dieing before I can even win my first tournament right? What choice did you have?"_ _

__"Stiles this... this is a life-altering thing, it isn't just something you can brush under the rug.."_ _

__"And I don't intend to, but I DO intend on dealing with it after the finals, and besides," he paused, smirking as he walked towards Derek and set a hand on his shoulder_ _

__"I'll be part of your pack now won't I? You'll _have_ to spend time with me now," he smirked_ _

__"I thought we pretty well established that that wouldn't be a problem as of the vault," Derek smirked back_ _

__Scott cleared his throat, an unhappy look on his face as Stiles and Derek both looked right at him_ _

__"Right... well, the point is, I'm sure I can handle this, I know it won't be easy but again, if the only other option was death..."_ _

__"Right," Derek said softly_ _

__"And hey, there could be worse things you know, I mean, atleast I'm not a vampire or something," he said with a snort_ _

__"Hey!" one of the strangers- Mason? He thought?- shouted with a pout_ _

__...._ _

__"Oooh.... so that's why you were talking about this in front of them..."_ _

__Derek only shrugged, unbothered as he rose to his feet_ _

__"Alright, now that Stiles has proven to be alright, everyone needs to go to bed, the finals start tommorrow and I'm not cutting anyone a break just because you're tired, you can all talk to Cora about what room you'll be staying in,"_ _

__Everyone started to get up and flock towards an irritated looking Cora, and Stiles had started walking away too, until Derek grabbed him by the shirt collar and yanked him back a little_ _

__"Not you,"_ _

__"Huh?"_ _

__"As it so happens, the owner of the tournament has the right to invite one finalist of his choice to share his master suite for the night, if.... the other duelist wants to, ofcourse,"_ _

__Stiles beamed from ear to ear, eyes lit up as he wrapped an arm around Derek's neck, excitement bubbling up within him_ _

__"Ofcourse I want to! Water bed here I come!!"_ _

__"Wait what? I don't have a water bed, where the hell did you get the idea that I had a water bed!?"_ _

__"This is gonna be great, huge bed, werewolf boyfreind, I feel like I've almost already won, I just need the prize money and bragging rights and I'm good to go for the rest of my life,"_ _

__"You sure are easy to please," Derek said dryly, standing up from his chair and putting an arm around Stiles' back, starting to lead him back towards the stairs_ _

__"So ah... what's the deal with Malia anyway? Did she seriously get thirteen star chips?" Stiles asked under his breath_ _

__Derek looked like that very question shaved twenty years off of his life expactancy, shaking his head as they walked up the stairs_ _

__"I'll..... tell you over breakfast, let's just leave it at that,"_ _

__"Fair.... oh, that reminds me, you never did tell me what you meant earlier about the Hales _taking ownership_ of Duel Monsters,"_ _

__"Mmm.... I'll tell you over dinner,"_ _

__"Oh come on Derek! Atleast give me a hint!"_ _

__Derek rolled his eyes, shaking his head and pausing half-way up the stairs_ _

__"Alright fine..... it involves ancient Egyptian magic, dark magic, ghosts, and some very cute guys from Japan,"_ _

__Stiles was absolute _speechless_ for a breif moment, not sure at all how to process that_ _

__"You might have to make this a series of dinners over the course of our long and happy relationship, let's call it date night,"_ _

__Derek snorted, a soft, warm grin on his face_ _

__"Sounds like a game plan to me,"_ _


End file.
